[SMITHSONIAN DEPOSIT.] 




t UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



EVIDENCES OF CHRISTIANITY. 



THE 



EVIDENCES OF CHRISTIANITY: 



IN A 



SYSTEMATIC AND PRACTICAL DISCUSSION 



OF THEIR 



EXTERNAL DEPARTMENT. 



7 



JOSIAH P.'TUSTIN, 

SAVANNAH, GA. 

CHARLESTON: 

SOUTHERN BAPTIST PUBLICATION SOCIETY. 
1854. 






Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1854, by 
THE SOUTHERN BAPTIST PUBLICATION SOCIETY, 

In the Clerk's Office of the District Cp^^f the United States, for the District 

of South-Carolina. 




Charleston: 

TSEAM POWER PRESS OF WALKER AND JAMES, 
No. 3 Broad-street. 



PREFACE. 



The following chapters contain a very con- 
densed result of a course of study and reading, 
which has been reviewed and repeated several 
times within the space of the last fifteen years. 
The substance of the most of these chapters 
has constituted the material of a course of ser- 
mons, twice delivered, though much more 
expanded in detail, when publicly spoken, 
than as they appear in the condensed form of 
the present discussion. The occasion which 
justifies the writer, in offering the result of his 
labors for publication, has been, in part, the ex- 
pressed wish to that effect, of a number of his 
friends, for whose candor and judgment he has 
a great respect. 

It has also appeared to the writer himself, 
that a condensed form of scientific and syste- 
matic arguments for the evidences of Christi- 
anity, is reallj called for, by many considera- 



VI PREFACE. 

tions, in our own times. The large systematic 
works of the English, Scottish and American 
divines, are out of the reach of a very great 
portion of intelligent readers. Other smaller 
works on the Evidences, by English and Ameri- 
can writers, are still too large and expensive 
for many? who would otherwise be induced to 
read a summary of argument, when presented 
in a very brief and comprehensible manner. 
There are, indeed, several short treatises on 
this subject, by American writers ; but instances 
of this kind, so far as known to the author, are 
restricted to some separate and striking views, 
presenting only one line of argument, or, at 
most, only a few of the leading branches in the 
science of Christian Evidences. For popular 
effect, and personal conviction, such methods 
are invaluable. 

It has, however, come to the knowledge of 
the present writer, that experienced instructors 
of youth, especially, have often felt the necessity 
of a small book, which would afford a com- 
plete view of the main departments of external 
evidence, each in its proper measure, and in a 
condensed and scientific form. A Text Book 
for Academies, and the higher order of Female 
Collegiate Institutes, which could be digested 
and remembered from the daily recitations of 



PREFACE. Vll 

one academic term of ordinary length, has been 
considered a desideratum. 

But it is chief!}' for the purpose of doing good 
among the general mass of reflecting persons, 
and especially the young, that this treatise is 
now offered to the public. With this view, it 
has been encumbered in as small a degree as 
was possible to avoid, with no array of critical 
references, or of quotations, the means for the 
verification of which would be out of the reach 
of the general reader, The sparse allusions to 
historical and critical authorities can, in every 
instance in this book, be verified by any one 
having access to an ordinarily well selected 
collegiate library. 

The writer has aimed at exhibiting those 
topics of argument which involve the questions 
most interesting in view of our present histori- 
cal stand- point, and the existing stage in the 
progress of society. Accordingly, while giving 
their relative importance to the successive 
branches of argument, there is special atten- 
tion bestowed on those departments which ap- 
peal most closely to the consciousness of those 
who have kept up with the discoveries and the 
questions which are chiefly interesting to read- 
of the present generation. The Primary Pre- 
sumptions in favor of Christianity, the argument 



Vlll PREFACE. 

from Prophecy, and the Proof of Inspiration, 
are believed to be among the most prominent 
exponents of the history and progress of opin- 
ion, now prevailing among many classes in our 
own country, and in other lands. 

The peculiar and primary admissions which 
are thus conceded to the importance of the sub- 
ject under consideration, have given the ad- 
vantage, in this brief work, of estimating the 
weight of the leading arguments which follow, 
without requiring the customary amount of 
historical and critical detail, which make up 
the bulk of the works on the Evidences of 
Christianity. 

There are several specific points of illustra- 
tion, moreover, which have a peculiar applica- 
tion to the very year, almost, in which we live, 
especially in the chapters on Prophecy and the 
Propagation of Christianity. The effort to con. 
dense a system of argument, at once scientific 
and popular, in the brief space of the following 
pages, has occasioned the chief embarrassment 
and difficulty in the present undertaking. 

J. P. T. 

Savannah, May 18, 1853. 



CONTENTS. 



Page. 
Introduction, »•'----. 1_4 

CHAPTER I. 

The requisite Spirit tor studying- Christianity, - 5-19 
1. Distrust of the capacity and extent of human 
reason. 2. Candor and docility. 3. Hu- 
mility. 4. Practical obedience. 5. Prayer. 

CHAPTER II. 
Primary Presumptions ra favor of Christianity, - 20-46 
Section I. Acknowledged necessity for a Reve- 
lation, 21-27 

Section II. Presumptive indications of the truth 
of Christianity , which are claimed 
by no other religion, - - - 27-38 
1. High antiquity. 2. Supernatural evidence, 
appealing to testimony. 3. Unprecedented 
Morality. 4. Relative advance of society. 
5. The Bible antecedent to all beneficial 
changes. 6. Acknowledged adaptation to a 
moral and probationary state. 
Section III. Acknowledged preparation of the 
world for the reception of Christi- 
anity at its first introduction, - 38-46 



X CONTENTS. 

1. General belief of the coming of an extraordi- 
nary person. 2. Geographical and commer- 
cial condition of the world. 3. The two 
great languages of the ancient world. 4. Spir- 
it of investigation. 5. Condition of the Jewish 
people. 

CHAPTER III. 

Authenticity of the Christian Scriptures, - 
Section I. Definition of Authenticity, 
Section II, Testimony of contemporaneous writers. 
Section III. Writers immediately subsequent to 

the apostles, - 
Section IV. Critical tests of the early Christian 

writers, - 

Section V. Testimony of the ancient Heathen and 

Jewish adversaries, - ■ ' - 
Section VI. Principles which disprove the claims 

of all others as inspired writers, 

CHAPTER IV. 

Credibility of the Scriptures, - - 

Section I. Definition of Credibility , - 
Section II. Contemporary and collateral proofs of 
the facts related in the New Testa- 
ment, ------ 

Section III. The character and situation cf the 
Bible writers precluded the possibi- 
lity of their recording falsehoods for 
truths, - 



Page. 



47-70 
48-55 
55-58 

58-61 

61-63 

63-66 

66-70 



71-93 
71-74 



74-83 



83-93 



CHAPTER V. 
Miracles, 

Section I. Definition of Miracles, 
Section II. Purposes of Miracles, 
Section III. Credibility of Miracles, 



94-118 

95-97 

97-103 

103-114 



CONTENTS. XI 

Page 
Section IV. Miracles are to he received on testi- 
mony, 114-118 

CHAPTER VI. 

Prophecy, 119-134 

Section I. Nature and design of Prophecy , - 120-134 
1. The Old Testament was known to be in ex- 
istence many centuries before the specific pre- 
dictions, contained in them, were fulfilled. 
2. Inspiration of the ancient Prophets. 3. 
Relation of Prophecy to Reveaied Religion. 
4. Moral and remedial purposes of Prophecy. 
Section II. Instances of fulfilled Prophecies, - 135-148 
1. Concerning the Jews. 2. Ishmaelites. 3. 
Egyptians. 4. Tyre. 5. Nineveh and Baby- 
lon. The four great monarchies. 
Section III. Prophecies concerning Jesus Christ, 148-163 
1. Proofs of a general expectation of him before 
his advent. 2. Predictions, concerning the 
time, place and personal character of Christ, 
at his advent. 3. Predictions concerning 
Christ's sufferings and death. 4. How Pro- 
phecy was applied by Christ to himself. 

CHAPTER VII. 

Propagation of Christianity, - 164-186 

Section I. Adequate assignable causes for the 
gradual establishment of Revelation 
previous to Christianity, - - 166-170 
Section II. Existing obstacles to the extension of 
Christianity were sufficient to de- 
stroy it, unless it had been super- 
naturally aided at its introduction, 170-176 
Section III. Proofs of the rapid progress of Christ- 
ianity, during the first ages of its 
history, 176-177 



Xll CONTENTS. 



Page. 



Section IV. The rapid progress of Christianity, a 
standard for attesting its divine au- 
thority, 177-180 

Section V. All other religions can be adequately 
accounted for, by known human cau- 
ses, and by known historical facts, 181-186 

CHAPTER VIII. 
Beneficence of Christianity, - 187-207 

Section I. Causes of failure in all other religions 

previously to Christianity, - • 188-192 

Section II. Positive blessings of Christianity, in 
mitigating the horrors of crime, and 
the violence of human passions, - 192-197 

Section III. Power of Christianity , in rectifying 

the natural affections, - - - 197-200 

Section IV. Provisions of Christianity for institu- 
tions of beneficence, - - - 200-204 

Section V. Effects of Christianity on the charac- 
ters of individual Christians,, - 204-207 

CHAPTER IX. 

Inspiration of the Scriptures, - 208-249 

Section I. Nature of inspiration as a doctrinal 

proposition, ----- 211-220 

Section II. Character of inspiration as asserted in 

the Scriptures, - 220-229 

Section III. Inspiration of the Scriptures, attested 

by Miracles, - 230-232 

Section IV. Collateral sanctions to the identity of 

the inspired Scriptures, - . - - 232-238 

Section V. Inspiration of the Old Testament, as- 
serted in the New Testament, - 238-239 

Section VI. The authors of the New Testament 
claim inspiration for their own wri- 
tings, 240-249 



INTRODUCTION. 



In order that we may "know wherefore we believe,' 7 
and be "able to give to every man that asks us a reason 
for our hope," it is proper that we should sometimes 
review and carefully examine the foundations of the 
christian system. This requires, not only the exhibition 
of the doctrines of the gospel, but also of the primary 
and historical evidences of the truth of Christianity, 
considered as a religion of facts. 

There are two methods generally pursued for estab- 
lishing the claims of God's revealed word ; the one, by 
taking the Bible just as we find it, and exhibiting the 
proofs of harmony in all its parts, and thus deducing 
what are commonly called the internal evidences of 
Christianity. The other method of vindicating the claims 
of revelation, is to follow up the several and independent 
sources of historical testimony, which, when all taken 
together, constitute what are called the external evidences 
of Christianity. Under the division of the internal 
evidences, are embraced nearly aJl of the ordinary exhi 
bitions of divine truth delivered from the pulpit, on the 
doctrines and duties of religion. Thus we practically 
1 



^ INTRODUCTION, 

act on tie principle that the Bible stands upon its 
own evidence ; so that, in setting forth the claims of the 
gospel, we do not ordinarily regard it as needful to 
adduce any frequent, lengthy or detailed reference to 
the proofs of external evidence, at least so far as derived 
from the records of history, apart from the Bible. 

The internal evidences of Christianity embrace every 
thing which relates to the efficacy of the gospel and the 
excellence of its doctrines ; the suitableness of Christianity 
to the wants and condition of man, considered as a moral 
and an immortal being ; the equity and benevolence of 
the christian precepts ; the urgency of its motives, as 
addressed to the hopes and the fears of man ; the marks 
of divine authority which attest the character of the 
person and mission of Christ, as the founder of this 
religion, and the many mighty works which authenticate 
the inspired character of the apostles and other sacred 
writers ; the power of the gospel to convert and sanctify 
the soul, and to ameliorate the condition of every portion 
of the human family. 

But while these internal proofs speak for themselves, 
in arguments which address the common sense, and the 
consciousness of men, there are external evidences which 
form the scaffolding for constructing this mighty super- 
structure of truth. Under this latter summary, there 
must be demonstrated the utter insufficiency of unaided 
human reason and the light of nature, and the conse- 
quent absolute necessity of a revelation, in order to 
teach mankind the character of God and his will, and 
the origin, nature, duty and destiny of men. The fact 



INTRODUCTI ON, <5 

of a revelation being given, it would require that the 
books containing it should be shown to be authentic, 
that is, written by the persons whose names they bear, 
or to whom the)' are attributed ; and that these books 
should be proved to be genuine, that is, the text remain- 
ing as uncorrupted now as when originally written ; and 
that these books are credible, as containing a true and 
trustworthy history ; and that their evidence has been 
certified by many supernatural miracles, and by the 
fulfilment of prophecies predicted many ages and cen- 
turies beforehand ; and that the religion thus certified, 
was established and propagated with^a success and 
prevalence, for which no secondary causes, or human 
agency, could be adequate to account ; and that temporal, 
personal, social and public benefits have followed in the 
train of this religion, which have never, in any similar 
manner, been connected with any other system pretend- 
ing to be a religion. 

But when we address ourselves to the study of the 
evidences of revealed religion, we find ourselves approach- 
ing a subject which cannot be grasped and bounded, in 
all its dimensions, by the compass of our limited natural 
understandings. It is bringing a subject clothed with 
infinity into contact with finite minds. The truths of 
revelation cannot be embraced in logical propositions. 
In attempting, therefore, to bring the proofs of divine 
revelation to our proper comprehension of them, there 
must be certain accompanying moral tempers and dispo- 
sitions, as well for their right reception, as for our moral 
probation in rightly using them. In investigating the 



4 INTRODU CTION. 

testimony for religion, we must, first of all, fix our 
position and point of view, and refer to those internal 
conditions in ourselves, as subjects, which form the suita- 
ble preparation for such objects as are presented in a 
system of revealed religion. 



CHAPTER I. 

THE REQUISITE SPIRIT FOR STUDYING CHRISTIANITY. 

1. The fact of a revelation being required, implies a 
distrust of the capacity and extent of human reason, 
If we were fully capable of comprehending revealed 
truths, previous to their being communicated, there 
obviously would have been no necessity for a revelation 
at all. God need give no assistance to man for what 
his own unassisted powers could attain to ; but when 
truth is conveyed to us from the invisible world, there 
must, of necessity, belong to that truth many of the 
features of mystery. Eevelation affirms something new 
and unknown, which it may not in all respects explain 
as to its peculiar nature or in all its remote applications. 
Eevelation states its facts, without explaining or reason- 
ing upon them. We are certified of the existence of 
truths, but we may not penetrate their nature, or com- 
prehend their modes of operation. The truths which 
the Bible conveys, especially concerning the divine exist- 
ence and government, and the modes of life in the future 
world, cannot, from the nature of the case, be attended 
with full and perfect explanations, to minds of such 
limited experience as ours. To comprehend subjects of 
an infinite extent, we must have infinite capacities. In 



6 THE REQUISITE SPIRIT FOR 

attempting, therefore, to measure the dimensions of all 
the subjects which are disclosed from the spiritual world, 
there must be a point beyond which our understandings 
cannot reach. We can see only the foreground of the 
perspective ; the horizon stretches away in dimness and 
distance, where neither the eye can penetrate, nor the 
thought can travel ; and this incapacity of our under- 
standings would not be relieved, if additional revelations 
were made, to explain preceding revelations, unless we 
should be re-organised, or constituted with a different 
nature. We should cease to be men, or at least, would 
be no longer suited to our abode in this world, if, like 
angelic beings, we were brought into immediate contact 
with spiritual realities, apart from any medium with our 
corporeal natures. Situated as we now are, we should 
only be encumbered and diverted by additional commu- 
nications, beyond w 7 hat is necessary for our present 
probation. Yet any revelation whatsoever, involves the 
idea of mystery, as it, of necessity, communicates with 
the regions of the invisible world. 

Still, the mysterious realities of eternity, so far as they 
are disclosed, are placed within the province of legitimate 
human evidence, and are supported by methods of 
human testimony. The authenticity of this testimony 
comes fully within the compass of our natural capacities. 
The truths of scripture, which were originally confirmed 
by miraculous agency, are conveyed to us through the 
vehicles of history, and they are certified by such authentic 
and credible witnesses, that he who believes that such an 
amount of testimony can be false, is unspeakably more 



STUDYING CHRISTIANITY. *I 

CTedulous than he who believes the miracles. But, 
though the testimony of supernatural evidence is inse- 
parable from these truths, they are mainly to be received 
on the ground of their own moral nature and internal 
evidence. 

On this account, we are held responsible for the right 
use of our understandings in ascertaining the truth, as 
we are for the conformity of our lives when the truth is 
ascertained. The evidence of the bible is in all respects 
sufficient for moral and accountable beings, such as we 
are. If the evidence of the bible were not sufficient to 
command our assent, no candid man would believe it; 
God will not require us to believe it ; and it would be a 
moral and mental perversity that would lead us to believe 
it. But, on the other hand, should the evidence for the 
bible be so irresistibly palpable to our senses, as, for 
example, a constant succession of miracles would be, 
our attention, in that case, would be forcibly constrained, 
our belief would be necessitated, and in the character of 
such belief, there could be no moral quality or virtuous 
motive; for what is forced upon us by the evidence of 
our senses, is simply the result of physical necessity ; 
or, if the proofs of the bible were of the nature of ma- 
thematical demonstration, they could form no test for 
moral character. And especially, if they were attended 
by the constant exhibitions of divine and miraculous 
intervention, no one could resist such belief, whatever 
might be his moral dispositions. There is no virtue in. 
believing that the sen shines; no one is made the better 
or the worse for believing what he cannot help believing. 



8 THE REQUISITE SPIRIT FOR 

If the evidence for the bible were insufficient, no one 
ought to believe it. But this evidence is neither deficient 
on the one hand, nor demonstrative on the other. As 
the case stands, the credentials of revelation are abun- 
dantly sufficient for every honest and candid mind ; but 
they come in such a way as to involve a moral disposi- 
tion, as well as the action of the intellect. Belief is a 
mere intellectual act, considered as the work of the 
understanding; but the appropriate temper of mind, 
which should accompany the act of the understanding 
is what we call faith. Conformity of disposition and 
conduct is the proper expression of our faith in any fact, 
towards which we hold any personal or moral relations* 
But our opinions are apt to be swayed by our interest, 
willing or unwilling. When the eye is jaundiced, or 
when it looks through a discolored medium, every object 
will partake of the hue cast upon it by the intervening 
agency; so that on everything which is to be submitted 
to the laws of opinion, whether it be in politics, or in the 
arts and sciences, the views and belief of men will be 
governed by their prejudged interest and inclination. 
If, therefore,, any one loves darkness rather than light — 
if his inclinations, whether from pride, prejudice, ambi- 
tion or education, from vanity or bigotry, or from the 
baser power of bad passions and dishonest intentions, 
impel him deliberately to evade the evidence of moral 
truth, there is nothing in the nature of God's truth, to 
leep such an one from believing a lie. The age of 
miracles has passed away, and even when miracles were 
wrought on earth, there was no such irresistible swaying 



STUDYING CHRISTIANITY, 9 

of the minds of men, but what they could reject the 
truth attested by these miracles, if they would. Our 
Lord, who knew what was in men, told them, "if they 
believe not Moses and the prophets, neither would they 
believe, though one should be raised from the dead." 
Hence our Saviour often repeated, "he that hath ears to 
hear, let him hear." And the inspired admonition was 
often uttered, " take heed how ye hear." For, while the 
way of faith is so plain that " the wayfaring man, though 
a fool, need not err therein," and " he who runs may 
read," it is yet possible, through the misleading of bad 
passions and selfish interests, to blind the mind and to 
harden the heart, and thus under the influence of a 
strong delusion, to believe a lie, and perish with it. 
When we consider, therefore, how much the heart has 
to do in teaching the understanding it is but a just and 
reasonable qualification for studying the evidences of 
Christianity, that we should pray to the Father of lights 
for that wisdom which will clear our minds from the 
mists of passion, and from all the prejudices which 
warp the judgment against the right apprehension of 
truth. 

2. The study of the evidences of religion should be 
accompanied with a candid and teachable disposition. 

There is a great distinction between credulity and 
docility. A docile and teachable disposition is the 
prompt and hearty yielding to the truth, as soon as it is 
presented, with its appropriate evidence. It is what we 
otherwise express by the term " candor" which, from its 
derivation, signifies white r or not marked by any stain or 



10 THE REQUISITE SPIRIT FOR 

false coloring. It is a disposition to love the truth for 
its own sake, without respect to personal interest, and a 
readiness to follow it out, in all its consequences. A 
docile temper is, at the same time, far removed from an 
indifferent and sceptical disposition. Where there is an 
inclination always to dwell on the mere difficulties of 
any subject, it will result only in a habit of doubting, 
and of universal captiousness. Accordingly, some 
persons, professing to have been previously too much 
inclined to credit the testimony of the christian religion, 
and unwilling to compromise their understanding by a 
predisposition and bias without adequate evidence, have 
afterwards resolved to suppress all partial inclinations 
whatever, and to place themselves in a position of indif- 
ference or neutrality until they could have demonstrative 
proof that no objections could be found against any of 
the doctrines and facts of revelation. Unconsciously to 
themselves, a disposition of this kind, instead of resulting 
in candor, leads at length to universal scepticism and 
unbelief. If objections are looked after, rather than 
giving the mind to the consideration of the truth itself, 
and its appropriate evidence, it will only envelope the 
mind in the mists of doubt and obscurity, so that the 
mental bias, instead of being prejudged in favor of 
the truth, will be sure to be found in a state of variance 
and hostility towards it. A hesitating and wavering 
state of mind will unsettle the judgment of all its valid 
moral convictions, and will divest the affections of all 
their purity and sincerity. 



STUDYING CHRISTIANITY. 11 

The only candid and impartial state of mind is a love 
of the truth for its own sake, and a reception of it, 
in that peculiar childlike spirit by which the truth is 
received, on its appropriate evidence, without waiting 
for and courting objections. "Without committing our- 
selves, therefore, to any prejudice in favor of the bible, 
it is but consistent with every view of right reason, that 
we should seek for the suppression and purification of 
all untoward passions, and for a firm, open and unwaver- 
ing strength of spirit which will enable us to receive the 
truth in the love of it. 

3. The investigation of the evidences of revealed 
truth should be attended with the spirit of humility. 

It is one of the first principles of a sound philosophy to 
discover the limitations of our faculties, and the extent 
of our available knowledge. Accordingly, he who 
acquires the most knowledge, is impressed by his increas- 
ing acquisitions, with the great extent of what is yet to 
be learned. By every new attainment, he is placed on 
the boundaries of knowledge un thought of, and unex- 
plored before. The farther a rightminded man penetrates 
within the great storehouse of universal truth, the more 
does he feel the restrictions placed upon him by his own 
ignorance. Humility is, therefore, the appropriate 
temper for one who is placed in such relations to the 
illimitable regions of unknown truth. This world is but 
a speck in the vast assemblage of worlds comprised in 
the universe, and the longest life can only be spent in 
learning some of the primary lessons of what is comprised 



12 THE BEQUISITE SPIRIT FOR 

in this small sphere of existence. How little does the 
most studious and industrious man, or the keenest and 
profoundest mind, penetrate beyond the mere surface 
of things ! 

But it is one of the legitimate conditions for our 
growth in knowledge, that we are to receive into our 
minds the result of the attainments of those who have 
gone before us. Otherwise, the same slow and unavail- 
ing process must be gone over, by each person and by 
each generation, in their turn, without gathering up any 
of the treasured knowledge from preceding generations, 
and the attainments of every individual would forever 
die with himself. The race of man has been occupyng 
this world for several thousand years, and each genera- 
tion and each individual has had to learn something, 
which, severally and in turn, is the result to be entailed 
to those born after them, and who are to make a place 
for others following after them. Wisdom is much the 
same in any one generation as in another; but it is no 
part of wisdom to discredit the sources of knowledge, 
which have been opened to us by our predecessors; and 
an humble and respectful deference to the wisdom of 
those who have lived before us, is a necessary mental 
qualification for our receiving aright the larger part of 
all attainable human knowledge. 

It is the vice and infirmity of our minds, to imagine 
that we know very much, and that our predecessors 
knew very little. The modern scientific discoveries and 
their applications to art, such as the use of the compass, 
the art of printing and the use of steam, electricity, 



STUDYING CHRISTIANITY. 13 

caloric and other chemical agents, for the manifold pur- 
poses of human industry, have indeed placed the world 
much in advance, in respect to all the material interests 
of civilization. But, for aught we know, some of the 
most important agents in nature are only now again to 
be reproduced and applied, which may have been used 
amongst the ancients, in a perfection surpassing the 
knowledge of science attained to by the present genera- 
tion. Nineveh and Babylon, in extent and population, 
exceeded any cities now in the world. There have been 
sleeping in silence and in ruins, for twenty centuries, the 
remains of massive and elegant architecture, and splen- 
did statuary, and temples and palaces, which once stood 
forth in a grandeur never again to be outdone. "When 
such immense piles as the pyramids were reared towards 
the clouds, and such breathing statuary was called forth 
from the rough marble, and such indestructible colors 
were laid in designs and paintings, which have survived 
the waste of the elements, for thousands of years, there 
must have been, in those ancient days, the knowledge of 
agents in nature, and the use of chemical and mechanical 
forces, compared with which, our present appliances are 
but the beginning of learning the arts anew. Men 
lived longer then, and often, doubtless, to a better pur- 
pose, than we do now, and knowledge is a* slow to be 
learned with us as with them, who had much longer 
time to live and learn. 

Thus each one, in every generation, unless he humbly 
receives what is freely given from the past, would have 
to begin for himself at the beginning of things ; and we 



14 THE REQUISITE SPIRIT FOR 

can learn nothing from the past but what we receive on 
testimony. That testimony can be reduced to our per- 
sonal appropriation, only by our mastering the laws of 
evidence. It is by this medium that we are to receive 
the knowledge of revelation, which was made known to 
the ages of the past, and was gathered up, and trans- 
mitted by the written oracles, as they have been preserved 
and carried forward and brought down to our own hands, 
by the wonderworking and predisposing providence of 
God. 

The wisdom of all past ages has tested the validity of 
that testimony, which, after the trial of so many successive 
centuries, is now submitted for our cordial acceptance 
and practical obedience. Standing, therefore, in the 
presence of such inspired testimony, so divinely certified, 
how does it become us to receive it with an humble and 
deferential frame of mind 1 Unlike the most of human 
tradition and testimony, whose validity often depends 
upon a single line of evidence, or is confirmed only by 
the mouth of two or three witnesses, we have here a 
sacred document, supported by proofs, and by principles 
of natural evidence, with which the best attested records 
of ancient secular history can scarcely be said to hold a 
comparison. And as these sacred records give their 
revelations concerning moral laws and conditions of 
being, which extend through distant regions of this 
universe, it becomes us to stand at the vestibule of such 
a temple with uncovered head. When we consider the 
limitations of our knowledge, on things so tangible as 
tlie material world around us, we may well distrust our 



STUDYING CHRISTIANITY. 15 

own unaided ability to compass subjects lying beyond 
us in spiritual realms. And it is by this humble recep- 
tion of what God offers us on his own testimony, that 
we shall know the truth by the yery fact of receiving it. 
" If any man will do his will, he shall know of the doc- 
trine, whether it be of God." Thus the divine rule is 
made good, as declared by the psalmist : " the meek will 
he guide in judgment, and the meek will he teach his 
way." 

4. The application of divine , testimony should t be 
attended and followed in the spirit of practical obedience. 
All true knowledge consists in appropriating and reduc- 
ing to practice the information we acquire. Every true 
theory must of necessity be practical ; for theory is only 
the expression of facts as they exist. However many 
things we may learn in words, those words will remain 
but as a foreign language to us, unless we make the 
sense and substance of those things the subject of posi- 
tive knowledge, by reducing them to personal practice. 
Obedience to a truth is the only real key to its know- 
ledge. It is the spontaneous dictate of the conscience 
and understanding, that we are impelled to do whatever 
we know. The knowledge of a fact is a sufficient reason 
for our acting in conformity to it, if it comes within the 
range of our relations, and our possibility of action. 

It is only the extension of this principle of personal 
experience and perception, that enables us to apprehend 
the wide range of those truths which are presented 
as the evidence of the christian system. When, therefore, 
the truths of revelation are presented in their practical 



16 THE REQUISITE SPIRIT FOR 

aspects, and come within the obvious compass of our 
experience and observation, it is certainly the dictate of 
prudence that we should attentively listen to what God 
thus communicates. When God offers promises, and 
utters threatenings, there is surely nothing which men 
can present to disprove these declarations. Even if our 
reason could not see the fitness or necessity of those 
things which the bible declares are the necessary condi- 
tions for a future state of blessedness, it would still be the 
dictate of a right judgment, to credit declarations which 
are accompanied with all the evidences of divine autho- 
rity, and to reduce those truths to our own experimental 
application and practical obedience. 

5. The search into divine truth should be accompanied 
with prayer. 

It is possible for us to be ignorant of matters of the 
highest moment, without being sensible of our ignorance. 
Whatever will bring us an accession of light, it is our 
interest to seek after. But the dispositions accompany- 
ing prayer, and constituting it, are eminently those of 
calmness, serenity, seriousness of purpose, and freedom 
from the bias of passion. The very effort, therefore, of 
submitting our minds to such a frame as that of prayer, 
will help us to see clearly what, before, we saw but dimly. 
Thus many a doctrine of divine truth is relieved of its 
attending doubts ; and by prayer we gain such an 
insight and perception of a truth, as will aid our other 
faculties in prosecuting the investigation. The same is 
true as to matters of practical conduct ; reason may 
leave us balanced between opposite claims ; which way 



STUDYING CHRISTIANITY. 17 

the claim of duty preponderates in respect to any given 
line of action, may often be left only in confusion and 
uncertainty with a conscience which, is sensitively alive 
to its practical obligations. But a single gleam of light 
let into the understanding, or a single touch of a new 
impulse upon the affections, will often give a clear and 
distinct perception as to the way of duty, which, when 
once entered upon, will brighten more and more unto 
the perfect day. So also of afflictions ) many a visitation 
may seem so sudden and trying, that, for the time, it is 
not within the range of reason to sec wherefore God 
contends with his creatures. But when, by prayer, we 
gain the clue to his providence, how easily and clearly 
can we vindicate his ways to man ; so that many a one 
is led, with the strictest truth to say, " it was good for 
me that I have been afflicted." It is also a matter of 
personal experience with many, that they have had a 
foresight, penetration and fortitude imparted to them in 
the performance of trying and complicated duties, which, 
they are conscious, was the result of mental illumination, 
derived from opening the mind to God in prayer. Now, 
these things are not adduced, in this place, merely as 
proofs of the divine character of Christianity ; for they 
are matters rather of consciousness and experience, than 
of logical statement and discussion. But, what are 
acknowledged facts in the experience of the best, wisest, 
and the most virtuous of men, have claims to the assent 
and imitation of all men who have any earnestness of 
character, any seriousness of purpose, or any natural and 
unbiassed love of the truth. 
2 



IB THE REQUISITE SPIRIT FO^ 

If infidelity should prefer any claim to self-consistency^ 
it cannot deny that it is right and reasonable to pray foy 
illumination from some superior source ; and this, every 
scheme of opinion assents to, short of downright atheism* 
But as to absolute atheism, it is doubtful whether there 
is an intelligent man in existence, who believes that the 
constitution of the human mind can admit of such a 
monstrous conception. 

The acknowledged importance of those things which 
revelation treats of, challenges the attention of every 
being who is capable of considering the claims of 
evidence. The information which the bible conveys 
concerning the creation of the world,, the fall of man, 
and the redemption by Christ, can be met with nothing 
by which to prove their contrary. The history of man 
has given multiplied proofs that many of the most 
ancient prophecies have been most strikingly and literally 
fulfilled. This naturally gives the strongest presumption 
that all its remaining promises will be assuredly fulfilled, 
and its solemn threatening^ will surely be executed- It 
will be no excuse for anyone to say that he has not the 
abilities to compass subjects beyond the reach of his 
natural understanding, and that what we do not know, 
God will discharge us from the obligation of attending 
to. No man can claim for himself such a subterfuge, 
who has not yet made the trial of prayer and a serious 
application of himself to the means of personal investi- 
gation in the evidences of revelation. 

This is not taking for granted the truth of Christianity, 
before it is examined and proved, but it is an appeal to 



19 STUDYING CHRISTIANITY. 

right reason and to all just experience. If a man cannot 
submit to exercise the seriousness and meekness, the 
candor and docility, the humility and modesty, the self- 
application and observation, the spirit of prayer, and of 
dependence upon superior illumination, which are called 
for by an adequate examination of the evidences of the 
bible, then he is unfitted to canvass any great subject 
in its length and bearings, and upon a true philosophical 
basis. If such manly and serious attention cannot be 
tolerated, then we have nothing more to say to the 
sceptic and the gainsayer. If anyone wishes to continue 
in unbelief, he may. God will leave him to himself; 
even the book of nature will be closed against him. 
" But if any man lack wisdom, let him ask of God who 
giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not, and it 
shall be given him." 



CHAPTER II. 

PRIMARY PRESUMPTIONS IN FAYOR OF CHRISTIANITY 

Before attempting to show the positive arguments for 
the historical truth of Christianity, there are certain ante- 
rior or primary probabilities which meet ns, and form 
not only a natural presumption in favor of the truth of 
a divine revelation, but which constitute the introduction 
and the progressive transition of a system of evidence, 
ascending by gradual methods, from the probable to 
the positive, and from the natural to the supernatural. 
Instead of the burden of proof resting upon the advo- 
cates of a supernatural revelation, it will be found that 
there is a natural presumption in favor of a revealed reli- 
gion, when we take into account the acknowledged neces- 
sity for a revelation, the admitted facts which have 
distinguished Christianity in contrast with all other 
pretended religions — and the peculiar preparation of 
the world at the period when Christianity professes to 
have been historically introduced. 

The facts which are to adduced in the three following 
sections, being mainly admitted by the adversaries as 
well as by the advocates of Christianity, we shall be able 
to present the subject at least as an open question, 



PRIMARY PRESUMPTIONS, ETC. 21 

relieved from any anterior presumptions against the 
christian system, and shall then have a basis for the 
direct examination of the authority and genuineness of 
the Bible. 

Section L The acknowledged necessity for a revelation. 
While it is an admitted fact, standing out upon the 
face of universal history, that the state of man has been 
hopeless and miserable without the aid of a divine revela- 
tion, yet if that fact be disputed by any, and we could, 
at the same time, demonstrate the proof that a revelation 
has been given, this fact would bear upon its face the 
proof that a revelation was needed ; for God never acts 
without a reason or an occasion worthy of himself. If 
a revelation ever has been granted, it was surely called for. 
The spontaneous and universal dictate growing out of 
the weakness of our common nature has always inclined 
mankind to crave a divine direction. The most eminent 
of the ancient heathen acknowledged in despair, that they 
could find no human methods for amending the infir- 
mities of their nature, or for removing the miseries and 
sins of which they found the world so full. With only 
a traditional impression of the supreme power, they 
were constrained to look upward for some divine direc- 
tion. Amongst the wisest of those ancient and venera- 
ble sages, Socrates especially, cried out for help, in his 
perplexities, and told his disciples to wait patiently till 
some revelation should be given. This impression of 
the necessity and the consequent probability for granting 
to mankind a special divine revelation, has always 



22 PRIMARY PRESUMPTIONS IN 

made the natural presumptions in favor of a supernatu- 
ral intervention ; and it was upon the strength of this pre- 
sumption that men have ever been ready to give credit 
to pretended revelations, even where they were false. 

Just in so far as men have arrived at any tolerably 
adequate conceptions of the wisdom, power and benevo- 
lence of the Divine Being ; and as they have &een the 
compensating remedies in the various arrangements of 
nature and Providence for every form of natural evil, just 
so far has the corresponding conviction irresistably arisen 
that there must be a divine revelation as an equivalent 
expedient for rectifying the moral evils which affect our 
nature. But, without this process of reasoning, most 
men intuitively feel that the end of their being cannot 
be discovered, nor their destiny realized, without the aid 
of a supernatural revelation. 

It is a primary necessity of reason that makes man 
look upward for some originating cause. There is a 
spontaneous conviction in the human mind which sug- 
gests the relation of cause and effect. The simplest 
notion which the human mind has of this relation is 
that of mere antecedent and consequent. But as soon 
as the mind begins to reflect, it discovers that there 
must always be some adequate antecedent, before the 
corresponding consequent follows, and this suggests the 
notion of a cause, or a something which has the power 
of bringing about the effect. Then, when this relation 
is discovered to be frequent, uniform, and, at length, in- 
variable, we arrive at the conviction that the change is 
affected by an agent, and that the agent produces the 



FAVOR OF CHRISTIANITY. 2S 

same effects. Accordingly, when the same cause pro- 
duces all changes, we give it the character of a universal 
cause. It only requires that we should add one link 
to another in the chain of antecedents and consequents, 
and we are of necessity carried back to a first self- 
existent and originating cause, the author of all changes^ 
the producer of all effects. If everything created, is 
linked to its immediate preceding cause, then it is self- 
evident that there must be a point where this chain of 
links ends ; otherwise, there would be a chain indefi- 
nitely long, the first link of which hangs upon nothing. 
It depends upon the free and unbiassed manner in. 
which men have used their reason, as to whether they 
can arrive at the conception of a self-sufficient, self-exist- 
ing, all-creating first cause; but, whether their reason 
is un perverted or not, it is always sufficiently true to 
the necessity of its original laws, to make men fee^ 
some premonition of the existence of a great first cause, 
and that the Supreme Being is in some sense present 
among his works, and maintains some direction over them. 
The fact that different races of men, in different 
times and countries, have held to a variety of divinities^ 
and to various methods of divine worship, instead of 
disproving the fact that man is impelled to religious 
homage, only confirms it; for the fact is universal, that 
mankind have some conviction in favor of the existence 
of a divinity or divinities. If, at some periods, mem 
have held to the belief of many gods, it only argues 
the grossness and imperfection with which they have 
applied their reasonings, when they have assigned to 



24 PRIMARY PRESUMPTIONS IN 

several gods, what reason teaches them should have been 
assigned only to one. For it is against the natural 
dictate of the human understanding to= suppose the 
presence of several muses, when one eause would be 
sufficient to account for all the effects. And- since we 
see that the same laws of nature equally apply to all 
parts of our system of plaBets and spheres, and thus 
becoming one universal system — the same principles 
of gravitation- and light, and motion^ equally taking 
effect in other parts of the universe, as we "see them 
taking effect in ows — we know that this simplicity and 
universality of operations eannot be the work of sever ai 
first causes, or, ereating agents which would necessarily 
imply collision or opposition ; but that there must be 
one simple, undivided, and all sufficient first eause. 

But the fact that men have misapplied their reason- 
ings, in imagining several divinities, does not affect that 
original eonvktion with which the mind of man is pos- 
sessed, namely, that every effect must have a cause ; 
and because mankind have often invested their divini- 
ties with gross and unworthy attributes, it only shows 
the inconsistency and perversion of their own moral 
feelings, but it does not change or disprove the fact, that 
in man's original moral constitution, there is the prompt- 
ing whieh inclines him to be a religious being. There 
is still the original principle in man, which makes him 
feel that there are some things which he ought to do, 
and some things whieh he o^ght n&t to do — a feeling 
which man participates in with none of the br&te, of 
merely se&tie&t ereaidock Accordingly, every maa 



TAYOR OF CHRISTIANITY. 25 

feels that the Supreme Being lias some claim upon him, 
and this idea of obligation or responsibiliy is the tie 
that binds him as a creature to his Creator. 

Connected with this primary impression of the tie 
that binds the creature to the Creator, there is another 
fundamental law of our moral constitution of which 
the mind of man cannot divest itself. It is the feeling 
or instinct of immortality. The being or principle 
which every one knows to be himself, he knows is not 
his body — that it is something independent of, and 
superior to his decaying frame. The concern which 
each one instinctively feels "upon looking into futurity, 
is not for a moment exercised concerning the body which 
is to dissolve in dust, but it is about that germ and 
principle of immortality which every living man feels 
and knows to be himself. In consequence of these 
moral relations which men discern between themselves 
and the Supreme Being, the question has arisen in 
every age, with keenest interest, " wherewithal shall 
I come before the Lord, or how shall I bow myself 
before the High God," " how shall a man be just with 
God ?" The natural and universal sentiment prompting 
these inquiries, has found one form for its expression in 
the offering of sacrifices, which have prevailed amongst 
almost every people, and in every age, before any revela- 
tion was known. These sacrifices originate in the natural 
sentiments of the human heart, and these sentiments 
have a power over man which can hold in subjection all 
other of the hearths strongest affections. 

There has always been a similarity amongst the 



26 PRIMARY PRESUMPTIONS IN 

most dissimilar races of people, as to the methods of 
offering sacrifices ; for it has always been believed that 
expiation of sins was effected by them. 

The sense of sin in the soul overpowers every other 
interest or passion ; for it involves our relation to the 
Supreme Judge, and it is connected with the question 
of our everlasting happiness, or our final misery or 
destruction. The tenderest ties of the mother's heart 
have often given way to it, and to appease her divinity, 
she has cast her only child to be drowned in the river, 
or to be consumed by a monster. It makes the avari- 
cious idolater lavish his hoaided wealth, to build a tem- 
ple, and to provide the expensive sacrifice to gain the 
favor of his imaginary god. It is stronger than the 
love of our present existence ; because to gain an inter- 
est in another life, many a devoted idolater willingly 
immolates himself, and gives away this short life to gain 
another. Such are some of the undeniable facts which 
under some form or another, and in a greater or less 
degree, appear as the primary conditions of our human 
nature. These tokens of the divinity in the world 
around us, corresponding to their appropriate responses 
within us, appear in connection with the moral diseases 
by which w T e are made conscious of violating our rela- 
tions and obligations to God. For the whole history of 
mankind shows that it has been their universal habit to 
violate those duties which are based on relations at the 
same time universally recognized. 

Now, while men have universally felt these moral 
diseases, the wisest of them have been unable to devise 



FAVOR OF CHRISTIANITY. 27 

any scheme of salvation which can meet their necessi- 
ties. Learning and genius could neither offer any ade- 
quate system of faith, nor satisfy the yearning desire 
of the soul for happiness. System after system has 
been tried, but they have all failed. The idea of 
immortality can never be expunged from the mind of 
man : and " the blood of bulls and of goats cannot 
take away sin." The hope of the heart has always 
arrived at the necessity for some communication being 
revealed which would solve the difficulties concerning 
man's nature, duty and destiny. Before demonstrating 
the conclusion whether a revelation has been actually 
given to the world, or not, we discover that there is 
primary presumption in favor of receiving the Bible. 
The Bible does indeed reject all other revelations and 
religions beside what is contained within itself. But 
with the admitted necessity for a revelation, we shall 
discover additional probabilities in favor of the Bible, 
from many claims which the testimony of the world, 
and of secular history, will concede to the Scriptures, 
which are not conceded to any other religion, and with 
which no other religion has ever pretended to hold any 
comparison. 

Section. II. Presumptive indications of the truth of 
Christianity which are claimed by no other religion. 
1. No other religious system, except the Bible, exhi- 
bits indubitable marks of the highest order of antiquity. 
While the great antiquity of the Bible, simply by that 
fact, may not afford a demonstration of its infallibility or 



28 PRIMARY PRESUMPTIONS IN 

inspiration, there is in this respect a presumption in its 
favor which gives it a claim to an attention that is con- 
ceded to no other system. No book, whether sacred or 
secular, which lays any claim to authenticity, precedes 
the times of Homer and Hesiod, a little more than nine 
hundred years before Christ. These two writers make 
the beginning of the certain period of ancient history in 
its secular department. The fabulous traditions of the 
ancient Pagan nations do not here enter into the account. 
But at this period, where ancient and authentic secular 
history begins, the earliest books of the sacred Scriptures, 
had long been written and in circulation amongst the 
Hebrews. The more ancient of the Hebrew Scriptures, 
are referred to, in other later sacred writers, who were 
contemporaneous with Homer. In the reign of Heze- 
kiah, they are spoken of, as " the law of Moses, the man 
of God." * But in more ancient times, far back in the 
period of the Judges, we find the written laws of the 
books of Moses in circulation among the people.f But 
no secular history pretends to anything like so high a 
date, as this written sacred history of the Jews. In the 
reigns of David and Solomon, we find the written sta- 
tutes and testimonies of the books of Moses universally 
acknowledged by the Hebrew people.J But no writers 
of authentic secular history have traced any true records 
beyond that period. The oldest Greek writers who were 
" the fathers of history," assumed no beginning beyond 
the well ascertained period of David and Solomon, 

* II. Qhron. 30 ; 16. f Joshua, 23 ; 6. } I. Kings, 2 ; 3. 



FAVOR OF CHRISTIANITY. 29 

Thucydides asserts that there were no authentic histories 
known to hirn beyond the somewhat fabulous period of 
the Trojan war — a period which no reckoning has placed 
more than a century beyond the time of David. 

The Roman people had hardly entered upon their 
infancy as a nation, when the ancient empire of the 
Jews, with all their accumulated records of centuries, 
had already out grown their long continued prosperity, 
and were about to be carried into a captivity which had 
itself been predicted in recorded prophecies that had 
been written for ages. But many of the classical Roman 
writers speak of the laws and the history of Moses, as 
of facts genuinely established, in periods long anterior to 
themselves. In the Augustan age, we find reference to 
the Hebrew people and their writings, embodied in the 
Roman literature. Strabo, the ancient geographer and 
historian, Tacitus the annalist, Juvenal the poet, Lon- 
ginus the rhetorician, besides many others, make fre- 
quent mention of the ancient sacred writings of the 
Hebrews, as of a high antiquity in respect to their origin, 
just as we now make mention of the earliest authentic 
records of English, or of ancient Greek and Roman 
history. 

2. No other book, assuming to be sacred, besides the 
Bible has ever appealed to the evidence of supernatural 
communications, or miracles, accom pained by such proofs 
as come within the laws of testimony. As to the 
mythology of the ancients, the most candid and enlight- 
ened of their writers regarded these systems only as 
impositions upon the credulous, fitted for the interests of 



30 PRIMARY PRESUMPTIONS II? 

state craft, or priestly and political rule. Long before the 
time of Plutarch, whose influence chiefly contributed to 
bring those ancient systems into disgrace, there had been 
no pretension to any historical evidence in favor of the 
received religions of the state. The only founder of a 
religion, besides the Bible, pretending to the support of 
miracles, was Mohammed, as late as in the seventh cen- 
tury of the Chistian era. But he never dared to assume 
the hazardous task of trying to work miracles ; and 
when his disciples pretended to force upon him the 
doing of what he disclaimed for himself, miracles were 
at length claimed in behalf of the religion of the Koran, 
but it was never asserted that any one witnessed them 
but Mohammed himself. And all the accounts of them 
are so grotesque and monstrous, and attended with such 
inconceivable circumstances, that their absurdity carries, 
on the face of them, their own refutation. 

Without, therefore, touching the question, for authen- 
ticating or for verifying the miracles of the Christian 
Scriptures, and the doctrines based on them — which are 
points to be reserved for a positive argument — it is the 
peculiar and commanding position of the Bible, that it 
stands before the world, claiming attention to the evi- 
dence of miracles and supernatural interventions, and 
challenging for its claims, the scrunity of all contem- 
porary criticism and all subsequent history. 

3. A peculiar presumption in favor of Christianity, 
was its unprecedented morality, at the period of its intro- 
duction. No other moral system could bear the scrutiny 
of enlightened reason, or the sanction of an unsullied 



tfAVOR OF CHRISTIANITY. 31 

eonscienced Even in the palmiest days of Roman litera- 
ture, the classical mythology which had been received 
from the Greeks and the other ancient nations, with all 
the additional Roman refinements, had become so abho- 
rent to reason and conscience, that large numbers of the 
cultivated Roman circles could not peril their modesty 
and virtue, by attendance upon many of the peculiar 
rites of their religion. At that period there were many 
Hebrews residing in their proper quarters in the city of 
Rome ; and Roman poets and historians tell us, that the 
virtuous and refined of their own people who felt im- 
pelled to attend on some institutions of public worship, 
were accustomed often to repair to the Hebrew places of 
worship, witnessing services which would not degrade 
their intellect, or shock their virtue. And yet the writ- 
ings of these most refined Romans themselves are so 
sullied with impurity, that of those remains of their 
literature which have come down to us, we are obliged 
in educating our youth, to read the classics mostly in 
expurgated editions. No person of delicate virtue could 
sanction the reading of the ancient classics, except those 
editions which are used in our schools and colleges, and 
in which their original odious features are revised and 
suppressed. 

Some of the ancient and oriental philosophers, indeed, 
had high conceptions of many intellectual, and even of 
some theological truths; but they held that there must 
be one belief for the initiated and another for the crowd ; 
they never maintained the obligation of reducing their 
moral maxims to practice ; and even when their own 



32 PRIMARY PRESUMPTIONS IN 

writings are found least objectionable, the character of 
the writers was often debased by vicious conduct. Even 
Socrates himself, the father of wisdom among the 
Greeks, has left a lasting stain and suspicion upon 
his character, by the arts of immorality which he prac- 
tically taught at Athens — justifying methods of seduction 
from virtue which cannot here be mentioned. While 
the writings of Socrates, and Plato, and Aristotle and 
Lycurgus, and in later periods, the writings of Zeno, 
Lactantius and Cicero, may be read with pleasure, for 
their maxims of virtue, and as works addressed to the 
imagination, yet they never produced any practical good 
effect upon their own generations, or upon the moral 
welfare of later times. But the Christian Scriptures 
reached the hearts and controlled the lives of those by 
whom they were received from the beginning — and at 
the introduction of Christianity there was formed a great 
dividing line between ancient and modern times. That 
dividing line was no more a permanent historical land- 
mark, than it was a turning point in the moral direction of 
human affairs, and a visible change in the condition and 
progress of human society. 

If the changes wrought upon the morals of society, 
contemporaneously with the introduction of Christianity, 
could not be demonstrated to have been caused by its 
agency alone, it becomes the adversaries of the Chris- 
tian system to explain the facts, and account for the 
cause. The burden of proof rests on them. The pre- 
sumption is all on the side of Christianity. 

4. The religion of the Bible has always maintained 



FAVOR OF CHRISTIANITY. 33 

its relative position in advance of the human race, which 
it gained at the beginning of its progress. Few great 
men have ever much outlived their own times ; for in 
their living day, they could not advance much beyond 
the experience of their cotemporaries. Even when 
some great genius has occasionally arisen, to grope 
after, and grapple and bring to light some previously 
unknown truths, the original discovery has nearly always 
been modified by additional discoveries soon following 
after ; and the great man of his day is soon thrown 
back among the things of the past. So that many a 
child can comprehend the profound discoveries brought 
out by Newton in philosophy, or by Milton and Bacon 
in politics ; and many a plain man in our day, can 
detect important errors in some features of those systems 
which gave to such geniuses their claims to immortal 
remembrance. But the influence of the Bible has never 
fluctuated or receded, except when the sacred records 
themselves were interdicted, as in the days of their long 
concealment in their prison house at Rome. Still with 
all the world's progress and its changes, the Bible keeps 
as much in advance of man, as ever. After nearly 
thirty-three centuries since the books of Moses were 
published, and eighteen centuries since the Christian 
Scriptures were written, the world has never approxi- 
mated to this sacred standard of truth, and the Bible 
still holds its sublime position above all other systems. 

At the same time, this sacred book is constructed on 
principles peculiar to itself, unparalleled by any produce 

tions the world has known. It is composed of sixty-six 
3 



24 PRIMARY PRESUMPTIONS IK 

separate books and publications,, written by men extend- 
ing over a period of more than fifteen hundred years, 
of every order of position and attainment, and a wide 
variety of genius and education, having for its writers 
over thirty different men, including kings, statesmen and 
prophets, to the opposite extremes of shepherds and 
fishermen ; but all parts of this great work, gathered up 
through so many centuries, are consistent with the grand 
peculiar purposes of the whole. There is one single 
plan running through the whole scheme; it has a 
beginning, a middle and an end; it is the product of 
one superintending mind, and the transcript from one 
original author ; and the main scope of the whole of it, 
is the development, progress and final accomplishment 
of God's eternal plan of redeeming mercy. 

In default of all other systems to give a satisfactory 
Solution concerning man and his relations, the Bible pre- 
sents an account, [the consistency of which lies on the 
face of it, and solves the problems of the original of man, 
and the creation of the present system of things. It 
accounts for the apostacy of our race ; it untoias the 
introduction of a divine system of law, the promises of 
a new dispensation, and the means of restoration, toge- 
ther with" the advent of Christ, and the doctrine of the 
gospel, and the prevalence of Christianity. From the 
period when the Christian system was consolidated, by 
reducing it to a series of writings, beginning with Moses, it 
continued to grow by successive additions, until in its full 
maturity, the completed volume of revelation has become 
the depository of all the saving influences to which 



FAVOR OF CHRISTIANITY. 35 

society in civilized lands now looks for its amelioration 
and perpetuity. 

In the meantime, kingdoms and dynasties have been 
overturned, races and nations have arisen and disap- 
peared, system after system has passed away ; ancient 
cities with their glory, live only in story and in song ; but 
while these have perished, God's revelation has outlived 
them all, and stands an eternal monument, unscathed by 
the beatings of countless storms. The acknowledged 
adaptation of the Bible to the moral necessities of our 
nature, in every state of the human character and in 
every condition of society, bears upon it the imprint 
of a message from heaven ; and yet who could suppose 
that shepherds and tent-makers and fishermen could 
have contrived a system so eminently suited to the 
necessities of our universal nature, among all kindreds, 
times and languages, unless they had been inspired and 
directed by one supreme and predisposing mind ? 

5. The religion of the Bible has been the antecedent 
to all beneficial changes. Whatever causes may be 
assigned for any great changes, the presumption is 
always in favor of that which is known to have been 
the immediate antecedent, especially when no other 
adequate agencies can be shown to have been present. 
The same change which marked the period of the intro- 
duction of Christianity, has appeared as the consequent 
at the introduction of the Bible, at every other period. 
From whatever date, or in whatever country, the gospel 
has had a free course, the moral, civil, social and domes- 
tic character of the people has thenceforward advanced 



SO PRIMARY PRESUMPTIONS Ilf 

together. The result is the same, whether we examine 
the condition of the heathen nations before the coming 
of Christ, or the state of the Pagan nations now in the 
world, or whether we examine the character of bodies 
of unbelivers dwelling in nominal Christian lands, or 
those countries of Christendom, where the Bible is not 
appreciated, or kept from the mass of the people. We 
shall find that countries, as well as classes of the people, 
and individuals, have been always happy, prosperous 
and virtuous, just in proportion as the Scriptures have 
been diffused and read. They can account for the 
means of purifying the fountains of domestic influence, 
for placing woman in her true position, and giving her 
sex that peculiar elevating influence which they have 
exercised in Christians lands ; they offer provisions for 
protecting the rights of all classes of society, for the edu- 
cation of children and for the wants of the poor ; and 
their peculiar influence is directed in softening and sweet- 
ing the human affections, and in making christian 
households the true nurseries for a prosperous and per- 
manent state. 

6. The Bible has an acknowledged adaptation to 
what mankind feel are the conditions of a moral and 
probationary state. If the divine authority and inspi- 
ration of the Scriptures are denied, there is still an 
adjustment in their truths, which has all the effect of 
making men feel that there was here an intended and 
instituted relation of means to an end ; so that men 
are constrained to act upon the presumption of the truth 
of Christianity, whether it is divine or not. While it 



FAVOR OF CHRISTIANITY. 37 

unfolds the bonds of obligation which bind the creature 
to the Creator, it assigns the origin of sin and death to 
their adequate cause, namely, the violation of the laws 
of God. But after disclosing the malady, it reveals the 
remedy ; it shows how we may be pardoned and escape 
the consequences of sin ; how, by the person and work 
of Christ, and the agency of the Holy Spirit, not only 
the guilt, but the habits and the power of sin may be 
overcome, and by the secret and powerful energy of 
these divine influences, we may become fitted for a 
higher range and a happier state of being. 

The acknowledged adaptation of this system of truth. 
to sustain the soul of man in the most trying times, has 
been illustrated in countless instances. Not only have 
governments and races of people been placed upon a 
basis of lasting prosperity, and savage tribes rapidly 
civilized by the gospel, which taught them good will 
towards their fellow-men, but in numberless instances 
in each generation, in our own land, under the obser- 
vation of every one, we may often see ungodly men 
effectually transformed in their principles and renewed 
in their character ; afflicted sufferers learning to bear their 
trials with peace and patience ; bereaved friends made 
reconciled to see their dearest loved ones surrendered to 
death, in the sure hope of a glorious immortality. This 
power Christianity constantly has, whether it is divine 
or not. But the sublime power of the gospel is bes 4- 
seen, in scattering the grief and dismay which gather 
around the chamber of death and the mouth of the 
sepulchre. Its magnificent truths and its impressive 



38 PRIMARY PRESUMPTIONS IN 

examples are realized and repeated and reproduced in 
the simple and striking experience of the multitudes 
who witness to its power in the beauty of their lives, and 
in their consolation and support in the hour of death. 
While belonging to a race of sinners under the condem- 
nation of a holy law, and as the sorrowful dwellers in 
a ruined world, the gospel turns all untoward things to 
the good of man and the glory of God ; and by its consol- 
ing and instructive truths, we are reconciled to evils that 
would otherwise seem awful and hopeless; we see a 
consistency, amply satisfactory to our perceptions as well 
as our experience, in the way by which God can be just 
and yet the justifier of believing and repenting sinners; 
and while reconciled to present afflictions and to the 
death and removal of friends, we can, for ourselves, look 
forward to the grave without a fear, and beyond it with 
joyful hope. These things are the leading subjects in 
those Scriptures which testify of Jesus Christ. u This 
is life eternal, that they might know thee, the only true 
God ; and Jesus Christ whom thou has sent."* 

Sec. III. Acknowledged preparation of the world for 
the reception of Christianity at its first introduction. 
Besides the acknowledged necessity for a revelation, 
and the many presumptive indications of the truth of 
Christianity, previously considered, there is a comple- 
ment and correspondence to these anterior considera- 
tions, in the state of the world afc the time when Chris- 
tianity was introduced. If it should be denied that the 
* John, 17; 3. 



FAVOR OF CHRISTIANITY. 39 

Bible is a revelation, it becomes the objector to account 
for that peculiar state of things which bore all the evi- 
dence of a predisposing preparation for the introduction 
and prevalence of the Christian religion. 

1. There was a general belief entertained throughout 
most parts of the civilized world, for some time previous 
to the advent of Christ, that an era was then at hand, 
when some extraordinary or superhuman being was 
about to appear. It is not the purpose of the argument 
in this place, to show the proofs of the inspiration and 
divine authority of the sacred prophecies. We only 
notice the fact, that certain Hebrew prophecies, profess- 
ing to be of divine origin, were then, and had long 
been in existence ; for of this fact there is very abun- 
dant and authentic evidence in contemporaneous secular 
history. If those prophecies were indeed inspired, it is 
obvious that in order to have the full effect of their evi- 
dence, those predictions should have been announced 
with great distinctness of particulars, during a period 
sufficiently long beforehand, so as to make it impossible 
that the fulfilment of the prophecy was, in no sort, the 
result of human conjecture or contrivance. 

But waiving, in this place, the question of the inspi- 
ration of prophecy, we may simply notice the fact that 
certain documents professing to be prophecies, and 
other collateral writings reputed to be sacred, among 
the Jews, had been in general circulation for several cen- 
turies previous to the personal advent of Christ. The 
coincidence between these reputed prophecies, and the 
facts which were verified at the period of the alleged 



40 PRIMARY PRESUMPTIONS IK 

appearance of Jesus Christ, form a strong presumption 
in favor of the supernatural character of the mission of 
Christ and the religion which he taught. These prophe- 
cies had become [extensively circulated among the sur 
rounding nations, especially those among whom there 
was any extensive literary cultivation. The Greek and 
Roman poets and philosophers had evidently not only 
read, but they had largely incorporated the sentiments, 
and much of the language of these prophetical writings 
into their literature. In the Eclogues of the Roman 
Virgil, written about twenty years before the birth of 
Christ, and in the prophecies of the Hebrew Isaiah, 
reputed to have been uttered seven hundred and fifty 
years before that event, and which, by the ancient secu- 
lar Jewish writers, are proved to have been written and 
circulated at least for some generations before that event, 
the coincidence is so complete between the poet and the 
prophet, not only in thought, but in language, that 
there can be no doubt that the Roman copied from the 
Hebrew. All the learned men of that age had free 
access to the sacred writings of the Hebrews. Ptolemy 
Philadelphia, one of the Greco-Egyptian kings, a great 
patron of learning, had procured a translation of the 
Hebrew Scriptures into the prevailing Greek language, 
at Alexandria, about two hundred and seventy years, 
before Christ. In consequence of this, the educated 
heathen, in many nations, as well as the Jews, were 
looking for some wonderful person, on the eve of Christ's 
appearance. 

What added to this impression, especially in £h$ 



FAVOR OF CHRISTIANITY. 41 

public mind of the gentile world, was that the era of 
Christ's coming was a time of universal peace among the 
nations. The temple of the Roman Janus, the divinity 
of civilization, whose doors were never closed except 
in time of peace, had been shut only three times, since 
the founding of the city of Rome, seven hundred and 
fifty three years before. The last of those times was 
under Numa, two hundred and thirty four years before 
the birth of Christ. But now, at last, the temple was 
closed again, and the minds of the civilized world had 
become prepared for the doctrines of the gospel which 
professed to be a religion of peace. 

This acknowledged state of things corroborates the 
alleged account of the peculiar and wide spread expecta- 
tion, which had been grafted into the public mind of the 
Jewish nation, that the appointed time was then draw- 
ing nigh, when their promised Messiah was to appea*. 
The force of this argument is not invalidated by the 
subsequent conduct of the Jews, who finding that Jesus 
was a meek and humble person, instead of a mighty 
prince, with pomp and power, were at first staggered by 
the impressions made by Christ's presence, so contrary 
to their previous expectations, and eventually disowned 
and put him to death. * But with all their early cavil- 

* The proof concerning the conduct of the Jews towards 
Christ, in its bearing upon the present argument, does not depend 
upon the narratives in the gospels, but is verified by the account 
of Tacitus, the " Act3 of Pilate" in the Roman Archives, and 
the reference of the earliest Christian Fathers to existing Roman 
documents. This argument is stated at length, in the Chap. IV. 
on " Credibility;' 



42 PRIMARY PRESUMPTIONS IN 

Ings, they could not, for a long time, become divested 
of the conviction that the time was then at hand for 
the coming of their expected national deliverer. This 
account is consistent with the narrative in the Christian 
Scriptures, which represents that at the early part of 
Christ's ministry, the Jews often, beset him with such 
questions as these, " art thou the Christ, the Son of 
God IP " If thou be the Christ, tell us plainly." The 
existence of such a universal expectation, thus attested 
by authentic secular history, in agreement with the 
Christian writings, showed that the minds of men, like 
grain ripened for harvesting, were possessed with the 
persuasion that the favored time for the world had 
come. 

2. The geographical and commercial condition of 
the world at the date of Christ's advent, was a pecu- 
liarly adequate preparation for the reception and preva- 
lence of Christianity, on the presumption of its being a 
religion intended for the race of man. Communications 
between different parts of the known world had become 
more rapid, easy snd secure, at about the time of the 
first years of the Christian era, than they had ever 
been before. At any previous period, if Christ had 
made his appearance, and commissioned his disciples, 
they would have been shut up within barriers which had 
isolated nations, and cut them off from each other; 
but the ends of the earth began to be viewed under 
one general prospect at the period marked out for the 
introduction of Christianity. It was the Augustan age 



FAVOR OF CHRISTIANITY. 43 

of Rome, and Roman power had constructed the Appian 
highways towards the seats of the ancient eastern civil, 
ization, and public roads, crossing Alpine mountains, 
had opened easy communication with the nations to- 
wards the west of Europe. Facilities thus opened for 
the rapid passage of armies, and for the transportation 
of persons and products, while thus designed by m'an, 
furnish the strongest indications that a predisposing 
Providence had reserved the universal diffusion of Chris- 
tianity until a pathway could be opened for carrying it 
to the ends of the civilized world. 

3. The state of the two great languages of the ancient 
world, rendered the period of the opening of the Chris- 
tian era, the true period of preparation for the intro- 
duction and preservation of a religion which must de- 
pend on written records for its prevalence. 

The Greek language had become well nigh universal 
amongst all cultivated nations. Although the Greek 
empire had been dissolved for more than one hundred 
and fifty years, and had long since been partitioned 
into provinces of the Roman state, the Greek language 
not only survived, but had then become the vehicle for 
literature amongst all the more polished nations of the 
earth. The language had never been so extensively 
used, as at the time when the Greeks ceased to be a 
people. It seemed to be preserved as the purest and 
most copious language of all times, in order to become 
the organ for conveying a religion which could thus 
pass, in its written memorials, at once to all existing 
countries, and to all coming times. The time never was, 



44 PRIMARY PRESUMPTIONS IN 

before the era of Christianity, when the Greek language 
was so perfectly adapted to be the medium for convey- 
ing a religion intended to be universal, and for preser- 
ving its records in a language which would be retained 
and made accessible to all people, and in all countries 
and in all coming times. 

The same was true of the Latin language, which was 
the court, and military and business language of the 
Roman empire; it was spoken by multitudes of all 
nations. Never was there such a medium for the con- 
veyance of ideas, by one universally spoken language., 
as when the Augustan age furnished the widely prevail- 
ing Latin tongue, for the diffusion of whatever was 
important to be made known by public speaking, or by 
written documents. 

4. The spirit of investigation was a peculiar prepara- 
tion for testing the merits of any religion claiming for 
itself an introduction at the beginning of the Christian 
era. At any previous periods, or in any remote coun- 
tries, the prevalence of ignorance and superstition might 
have had a large hand in introducing any new or false 
system of religion. And it has been in such dark 
corners, that every false religion, especially those claim- 
ing the support of miracles and supernatural agency, 
has originated. But it was in no dark corner, or among 
a generation of feeble, rude and ignorant men, that the 
Christian religion drew upon itself the notice of the 
world. The learning and mental acumen of the educa- 
ted Jewish classes were all brought to investigate the 
character and the works of the author of Christianity. 



FAVOR OF CHRISTIANITY. 45 

The Roman philosophy, brightened and enriched by all 
the previous culture of the Greeks, was then in its zenith. 
It was an age of scepticism, criticism and philosophical 
research. All the genius and intellect of the most dis- 
ciplined classes of that literary age stood ready to con- 
front the claims of Christianity. 

There was also the keenest political jealousy every- 
where on the alert to detect the weak points of every 
new system that offered. The Jews had become a peo- 
ple nearly conquered and dependent ; they expected 
a national deliverer, and this was thoroughly well known 
to their Roman conquerors. Every pretension which 
aimed at reducing any of the political influence of the 
Roman state would have been closely watched and in- 
stantly beset. And at no previous period in the world's 
history, could the religion of Christ have been subjected 
to such a scrutiny as would disarm all cavillings, as 
to its authenticity and credibility, for the satisfaction of 
all subsequent ages ; for it is well attested, that all the 
instruments of critical research were more thoroughly 
wielded in the Augustan age, than in any preceding 
period. 

5. The condition of the Jewish people, at the era of 
the first Christian century, afforded a peculiar prepara- 
tion for the diffusion of Christianity. Most of that 
once highly favored and remarkable people had in- 
deed still continued to dwell in the land of their 
fathers, but, at the same time, multitudes of them had 
then become scattered in the cities and towns of many 
others civilized lands. But, wherever they lived, they 



46 PRIMARY PRESUMPTIONS, ETC. 

were Jews still ; they retained their ancient worship ; 
they were expecting their promised Messiah. They had 
synagogues wherever they lived, and it was in these 
sacred buildings that the apostles might find access to 
preach the gospel in those lands where the Jews had 
been exiled, or had wandered. Thus scattered through 
all nations, worming their way through all the avenues 
of human society, amongst distant people, they were 
fitted by their circumstances, to become disciples, and 
in turn the successful propagators of the Christian faith. 
These facts are only here adduced as a peculiar indica- 
tion of a providential preparation for Christianity The 
facts here referred to, are attested by collateral and se- 
cular historical testimony apart from the Bible. In the 
direct argument subsequently to be considered,* we 
shall see how these indications were realized in the 
multitudes of the Jews who became the first converts 
under the preaching of the apostles. In turn they be- 
came zealous and successful heralds of the gospel. — 
Multitudes of them sprang up simultaneously, the fol- 
lowers of Christ, and preached the gospel in the coun- 
tries of their adoption. 

* Chap. VII., On the Propagation of Christianity. 



CHAPTER III. 

AUTHENTICITY OF THE CHRISTIAN SCRIPTURES. 

To any one who has candidly weighed the arguments 
in the preceding chapter, there will appear an acknow- 
ledged probability in favor of the belief that a superna- 
tural revelation was called for by the necessities of man, 
and by the peculiar preparation for its reception, at that 
particular period of the world's history, which answered 
to the time and the state of the world,when, it is affirmed, 
the Christian religion was established and propagated. 
The doctrines and institutions of the christian religion 
are based upon the authority of the books which are 
called the Christian Scriptures. These writings are divided 
into two departments, coiLinonly called the Old and the 
New Testaments. The authority of these two books 
stands on one and the same basis ; the manner in which 
the Old Testament is accredited and involved in the 
testimony for the New Testament, will be shown in a 
subsequent chapter on the inspiration of the Bible. 

In order, therefore, to show the foundations of authority 
for the Christian religion, it is, first of all, to be certified 
that the various books in the Bible were really written 
and composed by the persons whose names they bear, 
or to whom they are ascribed. The primary task, there- 



48 AUTHENTICITY OF THE 

fore, in the present order of proof, is to establish the 
authenticity and genuineness of the book of the Bible. 

Section I. The definition and nature of authenticity are 
to be attended to, before we examine the positive testi- 
mony adduced for its proof. 

When we speak of the authenticity of a work, we 
refer to its authorship, as distinguished from those works 
which are not really the productions of the persons 
whose names they bear. We thus distinguish between 
authenticity of a book and its credibility ; for credibi- 
lity simply refers to the correctness of the statements, as 
a trustworthy narration of facts as they truly occurred. 
A book may be authentic and not credible; for we may 
have such personal acquaintance with the author of a 
work, or such other means of knowledge, that we may 
not only have occasion lo suspect the writer's veracity, 
but may have good reason to reject the statements of 
the author concerning the facts or opinions advanced by 
him. But, on the other hand, a book may be credible 
without being authentic ; the statements may be true, 
as to the matters of fact, but the work may have been 
written by some other person besides the reputed 
author. 

Instances of this kind have sometimes occurred in the 
history of literature. The letters of Junius, for exam- 
ple, were written during a period of precisely three 
years, from January 21, 1769, to January 21, 1772 ; 
and while the statement and narratives are believed by all 
to be a true account of the existing state of things, and 



CHRISTIAN" SCRIPTURES. 49 

the comments and opinions agree perfectly well with 
all the well-known contemporaneous facts, yet as to the 
authorship of these letters, there is universal confusion 
and uncertainty. At the time when they were written, 
they were falsely ascribed to persons who, as it has since 
been proved, were not their authors; and in several 
instances in later times, the credit of their authorship 
was claimed either by persons themselves, or else the 
claim of originality was asserted by others for them, 
when there was no foundation in truth for such claims of 
authenticity. Here is an instance of a work being cre- 
dible as to its statements of fact, but not authentic as 
to its origin and authorship. 

Another very Interesting case of this kind occurred 
respecting the authorship of the celebrated Poem on 
Scottish Chronicles, called Oman** These "Chronicles" 
had been discovered and translated by a young Scotch- 
man, named Macpherson, of considerable genius, but 
who, in the manner of using the ancient writings which 
it was his fortune to discover, evinced a great deficiency 
in literary integrity. He published his work, which 
comprised some very ancient fragments of the songs and 
chronicles of the Scottish highlanders ; and, though 
those ancient fragments were the real history of the 
times, as far back perhaps as the fourth century, yet 
having thus fallen into the hands of this young author, 
instead of being published in their proper original state, 
with the names, if known, of their real ancient authors, 

# Mackintosh's History of England, Vol. I. Ohap. II. 
4 



SO* AUTHENTICITY OF TH$ 

they were appropriated and issued by Macpherson, unclef 
the name of u Ossian," with certain additions by this 
modern writer ; and with these modifications the work 
was reproduced as a genuine example of the history and 
poetry of the highlanders in the fourth and fifth cen- 
turies. The modern author did not claim the work as 
the product of his own authorship, but its authentic 
origin, if known to him, was entirely concealed. AfteF 
weaving up the fragments of veritable antiquity into the 
form in which he issued them, he sent forth these ma- 
terials re-constructed by his own authorship, as the gen- 
uine writings of certain, ancients, which had been 
recovered from their long oblivion, and which claimed 
an origin reaching back for more than thirteen centuries. 
Here was a remarkable ease of a work, which, though 
its contents were correct and credible, so far as contained 
in the ancient and original fragments, could nevertheless 
not be claimed as authentic, in reference to the persons 
and periods to whom it was assigned. 

Besides the question of original authenticity, as dis- 
tinguished from credibility, there is also the separate 
question of genuineness or integrity. This involves the 
question as to whether a book originally genuine, has 
undergone any material alterations since the time when 
it was issued from the hands of its reel author. These 
two questions of authenticity and genuineness may 
however be treated as one in the present stage of our 
investigation, as the particular means of settling the 
canonical and literal integrity of writings reputed to have 
been originally authentic, will be more definitely illustrated 



CHRISTIAN SCRIPTURES. 51 

in the proper place in these subsequent chapters.* Ths 
practical difficulty which we constantly encounter in a 
discussion like this, is not from the want of the mate- 
rials for argument and illustration, but from their im- 
mense numbers and variety. We have a vast storehouse 
of facts and proofs, on each of these departments of 
evidence, in our own and in other languages, which carry 
us back from the present to apostolic times. 

The peculiar difficulty of our present undertaking, is 
to compile, select and condense a few of the main fea- 
tures of each subject in the system of the Christian 
evidences, so that we may comprehend the bearing of 
the whole when brought down to the compass of a few 
brief chapters. And in exhibiting our argument for 
authenticity and the unmutilated character of the books 
of the Bible, we may restrict our view, at this point of 
our inquiries, to the New Testament alone. Whatever 
is proved of the New Testament can be equally well 
made out for the Old, by the same, or by similar 
methods of proof. The New and the Old Testaments 
stand or fall together : for the one stands upon the other, 
by such an intimate connection, that the New Testament 
is but the extension and fulfilment of the Old. What- 
ever may satisfy us as to the authenticity of the New 
Testament, will secure a conviction equally valid in refer- 
ence to the authorship of the ancient Hebrew Scrip- 
tures. 

In order to test the authenticity of certain writings, as 

* See particularly, on Chap. IX. 



52 AUTHENTICITY OF THE 

original, we must appeal to the contemporaries of the 
writers, for the evidence that the persons were known 
to be in existence who could narrate certain matters 
professing to be facts of veritable occurrence. 

We are first to find the proper names for these wri- 
ters, and then show that those writings were truly and 
really written by their reputed authors. Take for ex- 
ample, the gospel of John. It is a case that speaks for 
itself. The writer gives his own testimony as to the 
authorship of the book, and appeals to his cotemporaries 
who were acquainted with his person. The same is true 
of all the writings of the apostle Paul. He gives his 
own name as the superscription to each of his separate 
epistles, either by prefixing his name at the beginning, 
or else by referring to himself in the course of the docu- 
ment, or else by his personal attestation somewhere near 
the end, or at its last sentence. 

Thus, for example in the second epistle to the Thes- 
salonians, he testifies in these words : " the salutation of 
Paul, with mine own hand, which is the token in every 
Epistle ; so I write."* Sometimes he executed the 
writing with his own hand, and he says of the Epistle 
to the Galatians : f " Ye see how large a letter I have 
written to you with mine own hand." 

But in those ancient days when printing and similar 
mechanical means for recording knowledge in documents, 
were unknown, the art of writing was a separate and a 
highly responsible profession, which was confined to 

* II Thess. 3 '; 17. t Gal. 6; 11. 



CHRISTIAN SCRIPTURES. 53 

such occupation alone. The class of persons belonging 
to this profession, are sometimes mentioned in the New 
Testament history, as " Scribes." The restrictions and 
penalties by which they were obliged to guarantee the 
most perfect accuracy in their records, and in copying 
documents, were such as to make mistakes in writing 
of less frequent occurrence, than may be found in the 
best modern printing. Accordingly, we find that there 
is internal evidence in the sacred writings, that the 
Apostle Paul sometimes employed these scribes or amanu- 
enses to reduce to writing what he dictated, and then 
added his personal signature as the attestation of its 
authenticity. Thus the apostle's subscription to his 
epistle to the Corinthians was in these words : " The 
salutation of me, Paul, with mine own hand." * In the 
epistle to the Collossians, his testimony is to the same 
effect : u The salutation by the hand of me, Paul." f 
The only instance of all the fourteen epistles of Paul, 
in which his name does not occur, either in the intro- 
duction, or by some closing attestation, is the epistle to 
the Hebrews. But, not to mention the manifold inter- 
nal evidences from the various expressions and allusions 
in that epistle, it bears its own testimony towards the 
end, that it was written from Italy ; it contains that 
apostle's usual salutation to his brethren ; the writer 
expressly mentions Timothy as his traveling companion, 
similar to Paul's mention of Timothy in his other epis- 
tles. The epistle was undoubtedly written by Paul 
somewhere about the year, A. D., 62 or 63. 

*ICor. 16; 22. tCol.4; 18, 



54 AUTHENTICITY OF THE 

The New Testament consists of twenty-seven books, 
written by eight several persons to whom they are 
expressly ascribed. Fourteen of the^e twenty-seven 
books have their authorship assigned to tbe Apostle 
Paul. The four gospels were acknowledged by the 
ancients to be writings of their four reputed authors, at 
as early a date as we find any authentic and credible 
mention of those four gospels themselves. The writer 
of the gospel attributed to Luke, is also to be regarded 
as the author of the book of Acts, as appears from its 
introduction : " The former treatise have I written, O 
Theophilus, of all that Jesus began to do and teach, 
until the day in which he was taken up. v * 

The other writings of the New Testament are divided 
among three other authors, Peter, James and Jude, 
who with John and Paul, completed the remaining parts 
of the Sacred Canon. The epistles of John, Peter, 
James and Jude are styled the catholic or general epis- 
tles, inasmuch as they were written, not to particular 
local churches, but to Christians converted alike from the 
Jews and Gentiles ; or else, in the case of John's later 
epistles, and that of Jude, they were addressed to par- 
ticular individuals, though iutended evidently also to 
have a general application. Such is a brief summary 
of these New Testament books, as they stand in connex- 
ion with the names cf those who testify that they were 
their proper authors, or, as this testimony is borne to 
them by their contemporaries. We are now in a posi- 

*Actsl; 1. 



CHRISTIAN SCRIPTURES. 55 

lion to examine some of the contemporaneous and suc- 
cessive testimony in proof of the authenticity of the 
books of the New Testament. 

Sec. II. Testimony of Contemporaneous Writers. 

We appeal to the testimony of contemporaneous writers 
■whose personal knowledge of ttie authors of the New 
Testament confirms the authenticity of these books. 
We begin with those who lived with the apostles, and 
who shared in their labors. The references of these 
collateral writers, to the books of the New Testament, 
are now extant, having come down to us through au- 
thentic histories apart from the Bible. There are five 
writers in the first eentury of the Christian calendar, 
who are commonly called the apostolic fathers, from 
having been associates with the apostles themselves. 
Three of them are mentioned by name in the New 
Testament, and in several places. These are Barnabas, 
Clement and Hermas. The other two were Polycarp, 
the personal disciple of the Apostle John, and Ignatius, 
who, as early as the destruction of Jerusalem in the 
year, A. D., 70, was pastor of the Church at Antiock. 
The writings of these contemporaries of the apostles, 
are partly extant in their original form, while some 
parts are embodied in the larger works of those writers 
in the next century whose accredited works have de- 
scended to as. 

In the brief writings of these contemporaries of the 
apostles, there are references to, or, quotations from, 
asarly every book in the New Testament, as being au- 



Bd AUTHENTICITY OF TH& 

thentic sac-red- Scriptures, at that time publicly accredit 
ted. More than two hundred and twenty quotations, 
or direct allusions to the contents of the New Testa- 
ment Scriptures, are found in what has come down to us, 
of the works of those five contemporary writers in the 
first century. They style the New Testament books, 
collectively, "The oracles of God," and "The Sa- 
cred Scriptures." From this, it is. evident, that in 
the close of the first century, the several writings of 
the New Testament had already become united and 
collected into one distinct volume ; for, we find the 
same terms used by those who. lived in the next age, 
after the Apostle John, when they refer to, o^r, quote 
from the sacred writings, under one collective i&amev 
Tertullian, who was born only fifty years after the- 
Apostle John, often designates the compilation of the 
gospel history, as. "the evangelical instrument," the 
two parts of which, he calls " the gospels and apostles," 
and the united volume, he styles "The New Testa- 
ment." 

But long before TertuHian's testimony concerning the 
collection of the Scriptures into one volume, we find 
that Justyn Martyr, who was born ten years before the 
death of the Apostle John, quotes, from, and alludes to. the 
collection of the gospels, which he styles " the genuine* 
and authentic accounts of Jesus Christ and his doctrine." 
While he bears special testimony to the Book of Acts 
and to most of the epistles, separately, he also expressly 
relates that the Book of Revelation was witter hj 
4< John, one of the apostles of Christ*" 



CHRISTIAN SCRIPTURES. 5*7 

Thus we are certified that the principal books of the 
New Testament were all gathered into a united collec- 
tion, at about the death of the last of the apostles. 
Each book stood on its own merits. It had authority 
as a sacred authentic writing from the moment when it 
was published. As each of the gospels and epistles 
was separately addressed to some body of people or 
individual person, and was written by its own accredited 
author, there was every opportunity to substantiate the 
claims of each book, singly and separately, before they 
were gathered into one collection. The writings of the 
apostles were in the hands of each other, almost as 
soon as they were issued, as we see by the opening 
sentence of Luke's gospel. We find also, that Peter, 
whose writings followed those of Paul, testifies to the 
writings of Paul, in his second epistle, in these words : 
" Even as our beloved brother Paul also, according to the 
wisdom given unto him, hath written unto you ; as also 
in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things." * 
Each book would be authentic and canonical by itself 
before they were severally gathered into one collective 
volume ; but it is easy to conceive how all the different 
churches would be anxious to possess themselves of all 
the other writings which the apostles had severally 
directed to the other churches, or to individuals, 
before the apostles themselves had all left the stage of 
action. 

At the period about the close of the lifetime of tha 

* II Peter 3; 15,16. 



58 AUTHENTICITY OF THE 

apostles, there is no contradiction, but on the contrary, a 
general assent by all whose testimony has come down 
to us, that these several New Testament books, were 
called the " Divine Oracles," and u Scriptures of the 
Lord," as mentioned by Irenaeus, who was born about 
the year A. D. 97. 

In view of these contemporaneous quotations and 
allusions, it has been remarked by Paley, that " this 
proves that these books were perfectly notorious, and that 
there were no other accounts of Christ then extant, or 
at least, no other so received and credited, as to make 
it necessary to distinguish these from the rest." Thus 
we find that the books of the New Testament were re- 
garded with the highest reverence, as having divine 
authority in matters of religion, by those of the same 
generation with their writers, so far as we have received 
contemporary testimony of that generation. 

Sec. III. Writers immediately subsequent to the Apostles. 
We appeal to the testimony which has descended to 
us, from writers immediately subsequent to the Apostles. 
As early as forty years after the death of the Apostle 
John, we have copious testimony to the effect, that the 
public reading of the authentic writings of the New 
Testament, was a notorious and universal custom. Thus 
at that period we find Justyn Martyr giving the Roman 
Emperor, the following description of Christian worship. 
u The memoirs of the Apostles or the writings of the 
Prophets are read according as the time allows, and 
when the reader has ended, the president makes a dis- 



CHRISTIAN SCRIPTURES. 59 

course, exhorting to the imitation of so excellent things ."* 
About the same time, we find Irenaeus thus speaking of 
his associates : " all the Scriptures, both prophecies and 
gospels, are open and clear, and may be read of all." 
From this period onward for two hundred years, we 
have the same or similar testimony, till we come to the 
age of Chrysostom, in the fourth century (born A. D. 
347) who says : " the gospels when written, were not 
hid in a corner, or, buried in obscurity, but made known 
to all the world, before enemies as well as others, even 
as they are now." The whole scope of time which is 
really necessary to be reviewed in order to determine 
the authenticity of the Scriptures, is that period imme- 
diately following their alleged publication, down to the 
time of Augustine, who was born about A. D. 354. 

Of the many passages quoted by Lardner, from the 
existing writings of Augustine, the following specimen 
will show with what universal currency the authenticity 
of the New Testament has been acknowledged in all 
the times preceding the age of Augustine : ■' The gen- 
uineness and integrity of the same Scriptures may be 
relied on, which have been spread over the world, and 
which, from the time of their publication, were in the 
highest esteem, and have been carefully kept in the 
churches." f During all that preceding period, from 
the contemporaries of the apostles, we find constant 
notices of those sacred books as being publicly read and 
expounded in the churches ; extended commentaries 

* Lardner I ; 345. t Lardner II j 593-4. 



60 AUTHENTICITY OP THE 

were written on these books ; they were compared and 
classified in their proper order and harmony ; and ver- 
sions were rendered into many of the languages spoken 
in different countries at that period. It is forcibly re- 
marked by Paley that " no greater proof can be given 
of the esteem in which these ancient books were held 
by the ancient Christians, or, of the sense then enter- 
tained of their value and importance, than the industry 
bestowed upon them ; moreover, it shows that they 
were then considered as ancient books. Men do not 
write comments upon the publications of their own 
times ; therefore, the testimonies cited under this head, 
afford an evidence which carries up the evangelic wri- 
tings much beyond the age of the testimonies themselves, 
and to that of their reputed authors." * 

We may therefore sum up the testimony overlying 
this period immediately following the times of the 
apostles, by saying, that the writings of that early 
period which speak of the apostles, contain in some 
instances, several hundred quotations from, or allusions 
to the books of the New Testament. In Irenaeus, who 
wrote from A. D. 179 to A. D. 202, " there are," says 
Dr. Lardner,f " more and larger quotations from the 
small volume of the New Testament, than of all the 
works of Cicero, though of such uncommon excellence 
of thought and style, in the writers of all characters for 
several ages." In the writings of Tertullian who was 
partly a contemporary of Irenseus, there are literal quota- 

* Lardner, Part I, c. 9, sec. 6, t Credibility, Part II, c. 27. 



CHRISTIAN SCRIPTURES. 61 

lions from the New Testament, amounting to more tban 
thirty folio pages. There is nothing, in all the success- 
ive testimony down to the third century, which evinces 
the least particle of distrust as to the authenticity of 
the Canonical Scriptures. 

Sec. IV. Critical tests of the early Christian writers* 

The critical tests by which the early Christian writers 
ascertained and guarantied the authenticity of the sacred 
books, form an independent and conclusive process of 
proof. After the lapse of one or two hundred years, 
from the publication of the New Testament, there 
might have been some persons found who would begin 
to question whether the authenticity of these books 
could in all respects be relied on, or whether there 
might not also be other authentic apostolic writings 
besides the received books. 

Accordingly, we find the utmost discrimination and 
solicitude employed by the writers of successive periods 
from that time onward, in their critical tests, in order to 
guard the text of the sacred books. So anxious were 
they in watching against imposture, that in their ex- 
treme care in receiving and transmitting none but the 
true canonical writings, they occasionally at later periods, 
questioned the authenticity of some of the smaller wri- 
tings, such as the second and third epistles of John, and 
also the epistle of Jude. 

Such also was at one time the case with the epistle 
to the Hebrews, because certain passages in the sixth 
chapter Were perverted by the heretics of that period* 



62 AUTHENTICITY OF THE 

to maintain their own extravagant opinions ; and sortie 
Christian critics, on this account, showed their willing- 
ness to discountenance the heresy by giving up the 
epistle. The same was also true of the Revelation of 
John, because about the year, A. D. 300, the Millena- 
rians who then arose, made a great dependence for 
their extravagant doctrines, by mystifying many passa- 
ges of that book in support of their own delusions. 
But we have already seen that long before that period, 
the collective writings of all the sacred books had come 
to bear the popular and proverbial name of " the Sa- 
cred Scriptures," and " oracles of God." 

The great means by which the collective churches of 
Christendom then ascertained and perpetuated the gen- 
uineness of the sacred writings, for their own and for 
all coming times, was by adopting a system of Cata- 
logues, for distinguishing the authentic Scriptures from 
all others which were obscure and uncanonical. These 
catalogues-were drawn up by the greatest writers, and 
by the most ancient churches, in central and important 
places. 

Origen, who lived within a hundred years of the 
Apostle John, gives us thirteen of these catalogues, of 
which the seven which are the oldest, include the pre- 
cise names and numbers of the books as we have them 
in the New Testament. Some of the later catalogues 
omit the Revelation, for reasons not affecting its authen- 
ticity, but owing to the abuse which some had made of 
that book. The compilers of these catalogues, acting 
with the highest authority, acknowledged just such 



CHRISTIAN SCRIPTURES* 63 

books as possessed universal and infallible Scriptural 
authority through all the years which had preceded 
them upwards to the days of the apostles. 

At the period now under consideration, no heretics, 
or sceptics, had yet arisen who ventured to call in ques- 
tion the authenticity of the sacred writings, or, the 
agreement of these writings amongj themselves. What- 
ever false opinions or corrupt doctrines may have then 
begun to gain currency, found their origin by false inter- 
pretation, but not by denying the authority of any 
portion of the sacred writings. Thus we find Irenaeus, 
in the second century, saying : " So great is the certainty 
in regard to our gospels, that even heretics themselves 
bear testimony in their favor, and all acknowledge 
them ; each endeavors to establish from them his own 
opinions." 

Sec. V. Testimony of Ancient Heathen and Jewish 
Adversaries. 

We appeal to the testimony of the ancient heathen 
and Jewish adversaries for the authenticity of the sa- 
cred Scriptures. The first great opponent of Christi- 
anity, concerning whom we have any reliable account, 
was Celsus, a philosopher of great learning, who arose 
about A. D. 176. His writings, so far as they are 
preserved, are to be found chiefly in the works of Ori* 
gen. who replied to his virulent and ingenious attacks 
upon Christianity. Celsus, takes the doctrines and facts 
of the New Testament as authentically granted, having 



84 AUTHENTICITY OF THE 

been publicly known up to his time, without contradict 
tion, from the beginning. But while he publicly dis* 
puted against what was thus publicly known, upon 
grounds and reasons peculiar to himself, he never ques- 
tions any of the New Testament writings as being the 
works of their respective and reputed authors. 

About a hundred years later, (A. D. 2?0,) there 
appeared Porphyry, who is allowed by all to have been 
the ablest adversary against Christianity in the first 
centuries of its progress. He attempted, indeed, to 
invalidate the inspiration of the prophecies of Daniel, 
by pretending to show that they were written in the 
times of Antiochus Epiphanes, long after Daniel's day* 
But as Michaelis remarks, " while his abilities and situa- 
tion gave him every advantage to discover whether the 
New Testament was a genuine work of the apostles and 
evangelists, or, whether it was imposed upon the world 
after the decease of its pretended authors, no trace of 
such suspicion is anywhere to be found ; nor did it ever 
occur to Porphyry to suppose that it was spurious. He 
everywhere takes for granted that the sacred books 
were written by the persons whose names they bear." 

Shortly after, in A. D. 303, we find Hierocles, presi- 
dent of Bythinia, not only persecuting Christians, but 
publishing a book against Christianity, in which, as 
Lardner states,* there are extracts from at least six out 
of eight writers of the New Testament. He acknow- 

* Lardner IV; 341. 



CHRISTIAN SCRIPTURES. 65 

ledges their authenticity, but confines his arguments to 
quibbles and special pleadings. 

The last great adversary of antiquity against Christi- 
anity "whom it is necessary to mention, was Julian, 
the Roman emperor. He had nominally embraced the 
gospel, but afterwards apostatized ; and in the work 
which he wrote against Christianity, so far as it is embo- 
died in the writings of Cyril, who wrote in reply to him, 
Julian concedes the authenticity of the several books of 
the New Testament, the most of which, and all the 
larger books, he calls by name, and quotes from. He 
admits the most of the facts which they record, and even 
the miracles of Christ ; and while opposing Christianity 
on other grounds, he all along assumes and supposes that 
the canonical books of the Christians were authentic 
and original. 

We have now reached a point where any one acquaint- 
ed with secular or sacred history, can see how the 
course of testimony for the authenticity of the Scrip- 
tures flows on thenceforward, without any interruption. 
It may suffice here to show, in a brief summary, how 
conclusively the tests of criticism apply to vindicate the 
genuineness of the sacred writings, and by way of con- 
trast, how completely they fail in substantiating any 
apocryphal or spurious writings. In consequence of 
the fame and currency which gave to the Christian 
Scriptures such early and universal extension, in the 
course of time there were spurious writings invented, 
which were attempted to be palmed off upon the world 
as genuine sacred documents. But the following sum- 
5 



66 AUTHENTICITY OF THE 

mary of the tests of criticism, * will show how com- 
pletely the Scriptures are authenticated by trials of 
proof, which will apply to none of these other assumed 
Christian writings. 

Sec. VI. Principles ivhick disprove the claims of all 
others as inspired writings. 

The authenticity of the sacred Scriptures is supported 
by the application of 'principles ivhich necessarily dis- 
prove the claims of all other works to the character of 
inspired writings. There is no proof that any of the 
apocryphal Scriptures existed in the first century ; while, 
on the other hand, there has been the clearest evidence 
from the beginning, that the Christian Scriptures were 
the works of their reputed authors. The advocates of 
spurious writings can show no evidence of their having 
ancient manuscripts, or of being quoted by the apostoli- 
cal fathers, or of their being publicly read in the 
churches, or of being embodied in the authorized cata- 
logues, or of being noticed by the adversaries of 
Christianity; or of being claimed by any parties as 
authority in controversies, or of their being made the 
subject matter of commentaries, harmonies, expositions 
and discourses, or of being noticed in any way, by writers 
of authority, in the first three centuries of the Christian 
era ; but, on the contrary, when we find them coming 
into notice at all, at later periods, they are suspected 

* This summary is briefly compiled from Michselis, in his 
Introduction to the New Testament ; Home's Introduction ; 
and Paley's works on the Evidences. 



CHRISTIAN SCRIPTURES. 6*7 

and rejected by all reliable authorities. So that from 
the first, all other besides the Christian writings were 
the subject of doubt and reprobation, as to their au- 
thorship. 

A long succession of years elapsed in which those 
books were unknown, unmentioned and unquoted. — 
But the immediate friends and the earliest enemies of 
the Christian Scriptures, had every means of knowing, 
from the beginning, whether these sacred writings were 
genuine or not. 

On the other hand, all the internal and accompany- 
ing evidences of the New Testament, show that evidence 
to be united and complete. This appears from the num- 
ber and antiquity of the original manuscripts of the 
New Testament, and their agreement with each other, 
and the agreement of all successive copies and all exist- 
ing manuscripts. It appears from the language, style 
and manner of those writings, as to their agreement 
with the known places and times when they are alleged 
to have been written, and with r the characters of their 
reputed authors which we know from other and indepen- 
dent sources of testimony. 

But it is not our purpose in this place, to notice the 
evidences of the internal harmony and agreement which 
authenticate the genuine origin of the Christian writings. 
We have simply taken a point of view, from which we 
could survey the testimony of antiquity on the author- 
ship of the New Testament; and from that point 
onward, we can follow the broad stream of evidence as 
it appears in the magazines of history, both secular and 



AUTHENTICITY OF THE 



ecclesiastical. The versions of the Bible, in different 
languages, are known to reach, in many cases, much 
further than the fourth century. The different editions 
and manuscripts of the original Scriptures which Gries- 
bach used in compiling our received version of the Greek 
Testament, amounted to more than three hundred and 
fifty. And so, in every successive language as it arose, 
there were translations made contemporaneous with the 
origin and progress of each new language. Thus, when 
Christianity was introduced into England in the infancy 
of that nation, we find the venerable Bede, of the seventh 
century, making his commentaries on the epistles of Paul 
for the British Christians. Later down, we find that 
Wickliffe, who died in 1384, had made the first com- 
plete translation of the Scriptures into the English lan- 
guage, as that language had then become the foundation 
of the English language as it now is. And from that 
time onward, we are all familiar with the translation of 
the Scriptures in the version now used by us, which was 
finally completed and revised, and issued in 1611, under 
the auspices of James I. of England. 

Within the narrow limits of this brief chapter, it is 
only possible to give, in miniature, a condensed speci- 
men of the proofs for the genuineness of the Scriptures, 
as they have accumulated in many hundreds of volumes, 
ior a period of eighteen hundred years. But we have 
seen enough to know, that the authorship of these 
books is on a basis of perfect certainty. There is no 
other book in the world, reaching back into any period 



CHRISTIAN SCRIPTURES. 69 

of high antiquity, which has any evidence to be com- 
pared with that vast amount of evidence which attests 
the authenticity of the Bible. 

It becomes us, therefore, to prize those sacred docu- 
ments, which the zeal of the primitive Christians trans- 
lated and circulated in all languages; for which multi- 
tudes of martyrs died ; which the ancients committed 
to memory, and graved the contents on their hearts ; 
and which contain the recorded facts and doctrines on 
which alone we can build our hopes for eternity, or 
secure our welfare in time. There has been but one 
question before us, in this chapter, and that is, the 
genuine authorship, and the present soundness and 
un mutilated integrity of these documents, as they were 
first given to the world. The same faithful testimony 
which, at the beginning, gathered up and transmitted 
the authentic books of Scripture, was employed by the 
predisposing providence of God in preserving and carry- 
ing down that evidence to our present times. In every 
intervening age from the beginning, there was the same 
ceaseless vigilance in watching over the sacred deposi- 
tory of truth which God had originally committed to 
his people. Open enemies could never vitiate the 
sacred writings, which at the first were translated into 
so many languages, the copies of which being com- 
pared in the beginning, were compared at every step, 
in all the ages, and in all the tongues and peoples, 
through, which those venerable Scriptures were conveyed 
by each generation to every one succeeding. Heretics 
and corrupters of doctrine would often arise, only to 



70 AUTHENTICITY, ETC. 

pass away again ; but they watched each other, and 
in turn were watched too closely by the defenders of 
the truth, ever to be allowed to corrupt that sacred 
text which was the common property of so many 
contemporaneous Christian countries. And the friends 
of truth, even if they could have had any possible 
motive for changing its records, would always be 
watched with as much scrutiny as they themselves 
would ever exercise over the foes of the Christian faith. 
The wisdom and vigilance of all past ages have tested 
the validity of that testimony which, after the trial of 
so many successive centuries, is now submitted for our 
unshrinking acceptance and our unswerving obedience. 



CHAPTER IV. 

CREDIBILITY OF THE SCRIPTURES, 

In the preceding chapter there was exhibited the pro- 
per proof that the New Testament writings are authen- 
tic and genuine ; or, tbat they were actually written by 
the authors to whom they are ascribed. No one who 
thoroughly weighs the evidence thus furnished, can 
consistently deny that there is unspeakably stronger 
evidence for the authenticity of the New Testament, 
than for any other work, in any other language, or 
among any other people, of that period of the world 
when Christianity is alleged to have been established ; 
while the variety of proofs, through separate channels, 
all meet and concentrate in the same result. The 
authenticity of the New Testament being established, 
it lays the foundation for the credibility or trustworthy 
correctness of those documents whose authorship is 
settled. 

Section I. Definition of Credibility. 
It is the purpose of the present chapter to show that 
the writings of the New Testament are not only authen- 
tic, but that they contain a credible and trustworthy 



72 CREDIBILITY OF THE 

account of facts which existed in connection with the 
life of Jesus Christ and his immediate followers ; and 
that they contain declarations of doctrine, and disclo- 
sures concerning the future and invisible world, which 
are to be equally received, on the credit of facts so well 
ascertained, that no honest and intelligent mind can 
call them into question. It is not, however, our present 
concern to show the internal and moral evidence for the 
divine character of Christianity, as drawn from an 
examination and comparison of the Scriptures them- 
selves. The purpose now in hand, is neither to show 
that the Scriptures possess a character of divine author- 
ity, simply because their statements of fact are proved 
to be true, nor that these Scriptures are inspired by the 
special agency of the Holy Spirit, and preserved by a 
special superintending Providence ; for these are con- 
siderations to be attended to, in their proper place, and 
must be supported by evidence belonging to such state- 
ments, as propositions by themselves. But we now 
come to consider the simple and undivided question, as 
to the truthfulness or correctness of statements concern- 
ing those things which are recorded in the New Testa- 
ment w r ritings. 

The authenticity of a book does not necessarily prove 
its credibility. If a work should appear, not as a grave 
and matter-of-fact history, but merely in the character 
of some acknowledged work of fiction, the authenticity 
of the book would have no necessary connexion with 
its credibility, considered as a narrative of actual facts. 
The identity of the author may be certainly known, but 



SCRIPTURES. 13 

the genuineness of his writing would not establish his 
statements as facts. So also, there may be reputed 
works of history, well known as to their authorship, 
but doubtful and unworthy of credit, as to many of 
their alleged facts and sentiments. 

But the examination of the New Testament writings, 
in the process of our present argument, will, neverthe- 
less, involve the result, that the fact of those writings 
being authentic, will substantiate the certainty that they 
are, beyond a doubt, the true report of facts and events 
which actually existed as they are described ; and that 
all the doctrines and statements recorded in other parts 
of these writings are to be received on as equally valid 
evidence as the historical facts therein narrated. We 
need add nothing here to show, that the authorship of 
the ISTew Testament writings was fully acknowledged 
by a great number of independent witnesses at the 
time when these books are alleged to have been written. 
Heretics and open enemies themselves, of that age, and 
for the three following centuries, have transmitted their 
testimony, which agrees so well with the positive testi- 
mony of the witnesses for these sacred writings, that no 
other books, whether of Grecian, Roman, or any other 
ancient history, can pretend to any thing like a com- 
parison, as to the extent and sufficiency of the proof 
of their authorship. The authorship and publication of 
the New Testament writings, being thus attested, beyond 
a reasonable doubt, we can take direct means to ascer- 
tain the truthfulness, as to matters of fact, of what is 
recorded in these sacred writings. 



74 CREDIBILITY OF THE 

Sec. II. Contemporaneous and collateral proofs of the 
facts related hy the New Testament writers. 
The apostles lived and wrote in a period in which 
there is evidence of contemporaneous and collateral 
knowledge of the facts which they relate. We may 
select, for example, a case at random, which is found in 
one of the New Testament books whose authorship is 
settled as genuine. We have no longer any occasion 
to prove that these books were written by their reputed 
authors ; the matter now to be examined is, whether 
the facts here narrated are to be believed as true. Let 
us take a passage in the 26th chapter of the book of 
Acts. In this well attested authentic document, pub- 
lished in the age of the living actors whose conduct is 
narrated, it is stated that the Apostle Paul publicly 
asserted in the presence of Agrippa, the king of the 
Jews, the leading matters of fact in the life of Jesus 
Christ, who had been put to death, not long before, by 
the order of Pontius Pilate. While the apostle was 
making his bold and honest appeal to well known facts, 
he challenged the assent of the king to what the 
prophets had spoken concerning Christ and his religion. 
In this book of Acts, publicly attested and circulated 
as an authentic writing at the time of its recorded 
events, or very soon afterwards, we find the apostle 
appealing to the Jewish regent of a Roman province, 
and calling upon him as a witness to the publicity of 
the principal facts in connexion with Jesus Christ and 
his personal disciples. These are the words by which 
the apostle solicited the scrutiny of his hearers: "For 



SCRIPTURES. 75 

the king knoweth of these things, before whom also I 
speak freely ; for I am persuaded that none of these 
things are hidden from him ; for this thing was not done 
in a corner. King Agrippa, believest thou the prophets? 
I know that thou believest." The mention of this case, 
being found in a public and authentic New Testament 
writing, presents for our examination simply the ques- 
tion, whether the facts thus declared are credible, or 
worthy to be believed. The date of the book of Acts 
recording these statements, is about the year A. D. 62. 
Now, it so turns out, that we have in our possession 
the complete Roman history of that age, by Tacitus, 
who is one of the received Latin classics, read in 
our colleges, and to be found in every good library. 
Tacitus wrote just about thirty years after the date of 
the crucifixion of Christ, which agrees to a year with 
the date of writing the book of Acts. His " Annals" 
contain a true account of his own country and times. 
We give the following extract from his history, bearing 
a contemporaneous date with Luke's history. These 
are his words : " The city of Rome being burned, the 
Emperor Nero, to av^rt the infamy of being accounted 
the author of that calamity, threw the odium of it on 
the Christians, who had their name from Christ, who 
suffered death in the reign of Tiberius, under the pro- 
curator Pontius Pilate." In another place, referring to 
the same persecution, Tacitus speaks of the Chris- 
tians as then living in Rome, and who were condemned 
there, as " a vast multitude." * 

* Annals, Book XV., Chap. 44, 



76 CREDIBILITY OF THE 

Yet while Tacitus admits and recounts these facts, his 
pagan and philosophical hostility led him to express his 
opinion of Christianity by calling it " a pernicious super- 
stition.'' * It is a remarkable fact, that the sceptical 
Gibbon, of our times, while sympathizing with Tacitus 
in his dislike of the gospel, yet admits that the facts of 
the ancient Roman historian constitute an irrefragable 
testimony to the historical truth of the New Testament. 

But even earlier than the time of Tacitus, we have 
ancient testimony, that in the archives of the Roman 
Senate there was an official and authentic record of the 
principal facts concerning the person and the crucifixion 
of Jesus Christ. The governor of every Roman pro- 
vince made his official return of the acts under his own 
administration ; and their public acts were recorded in 
their proper place with the central government at Rome. 
Repeated notices are found in the ancient writers, of 
Pilate's Memoir of Jewish affairs, bearing the name of 
" Acta Pilati." The early Christians, when persecuted 
by the Roman government, were in the constant habit 
of appealing to these official records in the public 
archives. Thus, we find Justyn Martyr, in his first 
apology, written A, D. 140, speaking of the crucifixion 
of Christ, and appealing to the Roman persecutors in 
these words : u And, that these things were so done, 
you may know from the Acts written in the time of 
Pontius Pilate." In the apology of Tertullian, written 
A. D. 198, we find these words : " Of all these things 

* Exitiabilis superstitio. 



SCRIPTURES. 77 

relating to Christ, Pilate himself, in conscience already 
a Christian, sent an account to Tiberius, then emperor. 1 ' 
And elsewhere he appeals to this account : " Search 
your own commentaries or public writings ; at the 
moment of Christ's death, the light departed from the 
sun, and the land was darkened at noonday, which 
wonder is related in your own annals, and is preserved 
in your archives to this day." * Mention continued to 
be made of these recorded "Acts of Pilate," as late down 
as in the fourth century, when Eusebius, the great father 
of church history, refers to them, in the year A. D. 315. 
They doubtless remained treasured up in the archives 
of the Roman Senate, till, in common with the other 
state papers registered in the Capitol, they perished 
after the downfall of the Roman empire. 

But besides the classical history of Tacitus, and these 
evidences of the state papers of the Roman Senate, we 
have the well known letter of Pliny, to the Emperor 
Trajan, preserved entire in the original Latin, and which 
has often been translated and referred to, in Christian 
books in our language. Pliny was the governor of a 
Roman province ; and in giving an account of the trans- 
actions of his administration, there is a detailed state- 
ment of several leading facts, showing what was then 
commonly and publicly known concerning Christ and his 
religion. His letter is dated A. D. 170 ; and it thus 
bears witness to the w T ide prevalence of Christianity, 
and the general reception of the facts of the gospel, 

* Apology* Chap. XXIf 



18 CREDIBILITY OF THE 

within seventy years of the last of the apostles. The 
following specimen is an extract and a translation. He 
says — " The Christians rilled the government of By- 
thinia ; that the heathen temples and worship had been 
forsaken : that they met on a certain day to sing hymns 
to Christ as to a God : and that their lives were inno- 
cent and pure." 

It is also to be remembered that this letter of the 
governor Pliny to the emperor, was written obviously 
with the purpose of obtaining a cessation of persecution 
against the Christians, or at least, to obtain further 
instructions from Trajan. 

There would be no propriety in extending this brief 
summary, by giving extracts from other Eoman clas- 
sical writers, who make mention, to a greater or less 
extent, of the Christians of their own period, and of 
the then well known facts on which Christianity is 
based. Dr. Lardner, in his great work on the Credibility 
of the Gospel, has collected much of the evidence now 
extant, from contemporaneous classical writers, who tes- 
tify to the facts in the gospel history, while those facts 
were transpiring. Of those, whose writings have come 
down to us, in independent and separate channels of 
history, and to which every well read scholar in the 
classics may now have access, it is sufficient to mention 
the names of Martial, Juvenal, Suetonius, Lucian, Epicte- 
tus, and the emperor Marcus Antoninus. 

Besides these, there could also be cited the testimony 
of the open enemies of Christianity, as well for the cre- 
dibility as for the authorship of the New Testament 



SCRIPTURES. 



79 



writings. They not only admit that these writings were 
the proper works of those whose names they bear, but 
they also admit the historical integrity of the facts, even 
those which are the most remarkable, and the miracles 
themselves. But while not venturing to deny the facts 
recorded -in the gospels, they still attempted to invalidate 
the religion which was based on them, and to perse- 
cute those who became Christians on the strength of 
their belief in those admitted truths. 

Like infidels in other ages, they endeavored to main- 
tain their opposition to Christianity on grounds pecu- 
liar to themselves. Of such ancient opponents to the gos- 
pel, were Celsns, in the second century, Porphyry, in 
the third, and Hierocles and the emperor Julian, in the 
fourth century. 

But going back to the date when Tacitus, the Ro- 
man historian, and the writers of the gospel history, 
were composing their permanent though independent 
records, we have another historian of the same date 
who relates many events with the most circumstantial 
exactness, agreeing with, and in gome instances explain- 
ing, the writings of the New Testament, We refer to 
Josephus, the Jewish historian, who has always been 
held as unquestionable authority, with Jews and Chris- 
tians, and by his contemporaries among the classical 
people of Rome, and by all generations since. Josephus 
wrote a minute account of the civil and religious affairs 
of his people ; and though he never became a Christian, 
his writings, as valid history, wonderfully confirm the 
New Testament narratives. In one instance, he gives 



80 CREDIBILITY OF THE 

an account which perfectly explains a statement in the 
gospel of Matthew otherwise strangely obscure, concern- 
ing the unexpected fear which took possession of Jo- 
seph, when with Mary and the infant Jesus he returned 
from Egypt, intending to go into Judea, but on learning 
that Archelaus reigned in the room of Herod, he again 
sought flight and concealment. ~No explanation of this 
sudden and mysterious turn in Joseph's conduct is given 
in the New Testament, owing to its characteristic 
brevity. But Josephus in his history shows at large, 
the cause of it all ; it being on account of an awful mas- 
sacre which Archelaus had then recently perpetrated 
on several thousands of the Jews. 

The account which Josephus gives of the sudden and 
awful death of Herod, agrees perfectly with the record of 
it, in the 12th chapter of the book of Acts, only that 
Josephus explains and details more at large what the 
Bible account condenses in five verses.* Going farther 
back still, in verification of the gospel narrative, we have 
the account which Josephus gives of Herod Antipas, who 
put to death John the Baptist. What the evangelists 
pass over in silence, Josephus thus explains : " Some of 
the Jews were of opinion that God had suffered Herod's 
army to be destroyed as a just punishment on him for 
the death of John, called the Baptist. For Herod had 
killed him who was a just man, and who had called 
upon the Jews to be baptized and to practice virtue. 
And many coming to him, (for they were wonderfully 

* Josephus, Book 19, Chap. 8, Sec. 2. 



SCRIPTURES. 81 

taken with his discourses,) Herod was seized with ap- 
prehensions, lest, by his authority, they should be led 
into sedition against him. Being taken up on this suspi- 
cion of Herod, and being sent bound to the castle of 
Machaerus, he was slain there." 

Besides these ample and striking evidences that the 
evangelists and apostles wrote at a time when there 
were many other critical writers who have transmitted to 
us their contemporaneous and collateral knowledge of the 
facts in the Bible, there are other instances like those 
already mentioned, which explain difficulties left un- 
solved by the brief and condensed account of the New 
Testament writers. An example of this occurs in the 
sixteenth chapter of Acts. In the eleventh verse, Luke 
relates that " Philippi was the chief city of that part of 
Macedonia and a colony.*' Sceptics had long taken ad- 
vantage of this passage, to prove the inconsistency of 
the Bible account, since it was a well known fact that 
the city of Amphipolis had been erected as the chief or 
metropolitan city of Macedonia, by Paulus Emilius, 220 
years before the date in the record of Luke — while, at 
the same time, Philippi is here called by the designation 
which had previously distinguished the position of Am- 
phipolis, and there appears to be nothing in the state 
records of Kome to fill up the blank. Critics had always 
been embarrassed in attempting to reconcile this discre- 
pancy, since ancient Roman history had omitted any 
mention of Philippi being promoted in place of Amphi- 
polis, if that fact had indeed ever occurred. But in 
these modern days, when geology and antiquarianism 
6 



82 CREDIBILITY 0E THE 

have been so often employed to ransack the bowels of 
the earth for evidence against the Bible, it so turns out, 
that some years ago there were dug up from the ruins 
of Philippi, several ancient coins, on which are inscribed 
the elevation of Philippi, with a dignity and position 
superior to the former capital ; so that now, in the mu- 
seums of science, these coins are to be seen, with the 
ineffaceable stamp of Julius Caesar, bestowing the dig- 
nity of the metropolis of a colony upon Philippi, after- 
wards confirmed by Augustus. 

A similar coincidence occurs between the account 
in the 19th chapter of Acts, of the character of the 
Ephesians as the worshippers of the goddess Diana, and 
certain medals and coins which have been recovered, of 
late years, at Ephesus. On those medals are inscribed 
the precise designation which is given of the Ephesians 
nthe 35th verse of that chapter: "What man is there 
hat knoweth not how that the city of the Ephesians is a 
worshipper of the great goddess Diana, and of the 
image which fell down from Jupiter V The term in the 
Acts describing the character of Ephesus, is NEfiKOPOE, 
in the singular ; but the stamp on these ancient medals 
describing the Ephesians, is NE&KOPOI, in the plural. 
The latter term describes those who are addicted to wor- 
ship in the temple service. 

Monumental inscriptions, still existing, especially on 
the marbles in some of the seven cities in Asia Minor, 
addressed in the epistles to the seven churches by John 
in the Revelation, and many other similar inscriptions, 
larger or smaller, existing elsewhere, on marbles as well as 



SCRIPTURES. 83 

on medals, together with historical documents, all go to 
show, that when the books of the New Testament were 
written, there were contemporaneous inscriptions made, 
which to this day have outlived the effacing fingers of 
time. The facts on which Christianity is based were none 
of them hidden from the public inspection of the existing 
generation, in the age when those wonderful works are al- 
leged to have been performed. 

Sec. III. The character and situation of the Bible 
writers precluded the possibility of their recording 
falsehoods for tru ths. 

There are acknowledged facts in the case of the evan- 
gelists and apostles, which would make it impossible for 
them to have recorded things which did not truly exist, 
and to report them as facts. It is to be remembered, 
that besides the twelve original apostles, there were 
three others — Mark, Paul and Luke — who, by their liv- 
ing testimony, or their recorded writings, are the pro- 
fessed witnesses and authorities for the facts recorded in 
the New Testament. Eight of them are the acknow- 
ledged and authentic writers of these twenty-seven books. 
Their date begins with Matthew's gospel, not later than 
eight years after the crucifixion, and extending to the gos- 
pel of John, written probably about A. I). 97, nearly sixty 
years later still. With the exception of the first two gos- 
pels, several of the epistles, especially the two to the Thes- 
salonians, were evidently the earliest of all the New Tes- 
tament writings. It may suffice to remark, once for all, 
in this place, that the several separate books which are 



84 CREDIBILITY OF THE 

embodied in our Bible in its present form, are not al- 
ways arranged according to their dates, but chiefly ac- 
cording to their size, or their supposed importance. 

Now, when the Bible writers, especially those of the 
New Testament, committed the Scriptures as permanent 
records to the keeping of the first churches, to be passed 
onward to posterity, these records were publicly address- 
ed to the criticism of foes as well as friends, in the times 
and at the places where these recorded facts are said to 
have occurred. These writers thus publicly appealed to 
facts, which, if they had not been true, no one would 
ever have dared to assert them in such a manner. 

There is evidence on the face of these narratives, 
from beginning to end, that the writers were not cre- 
dulous and interested parties. All through their accounts, 
there are many things related by the writers discredit- 
able to themselves. They describe their own and each 
other's infirmities, in the most natural and artless man- 
ner; they had evinced their own weakness and incredulity 
at the beginning of their association with their Master, 
and the same want of faith is often betrayed by them 
till nearly the close of his ministry. At his crucifixion 
they forsook him and fled. One of their number, under 
every inducement to betray any false or dishonest con- 
cealment, if any such collusion had been practiced 
by the apostles among themselves, at last betrayed 
his own remorse in the presence of his Master's ene- 
mies, and died by his own hand, saying, "I have 
sinned, in that I have betrayed innocent blood." 

When the apostles, by the subsequent acquisition 



SCRIPTURES. 85 

of superior knowledge, and by power which they receiv- 
ed from a source above themselves, proclaimed and re- 
corded in permanent documents, the facts of Christian- 
ity, there were marks impressed, upon their authentic 
statements utterly at variance with the possibility of these 
statements being mere inventions. No better account 
of this case can be given in a few words, than by the 
testimony of Rousseau, who, while striving to overthrow 
Christianity in France, thus acknowledges the truths 
recorded by the New Testament writers : " Shall we say 
that the history of the gospel is invented at pleasure ? 
No ! It is not thus that men invent. It would be more 
inconceivable that a number of men had in concert 
produced this book from their own imaginations, than 
it is that one man had furnished the subject of it. The 
morality of the gospel and its general tone, were beyond 
the conception of the Jewish authors; and the history 
of Jesus Christ has marks of truth so palpable, so strik- 
ing and so perfectly inimitable, that its inventor would 
exite our admiration more than the hero"* 

To this testimony of one modern reviler, who was a 
critical genius, such as there have been few of in modern 
times, we may add the admission of David Hume, who, 
in his philosophical system, endeavored to overthrow the 
foundations of Christianity; and yet he admits and 
states a principle in his Philosophical Essays, which will 
make it impossible to deny the honesty and knowledge v 
of the truth on the part of those who wrote the New 

Emile. II. 98. 



86 CREDIBILITY OF THE 

Testament history. He says : " We cannot use a more 
convincing argument, [in evidence of honesty,] than to 
prove that the actions ascribed to any persons are con- 
trary to the course of nature, and that no human 
motives, in such circumstances, could ever induce them 
to such conduct." Now, in applying this principle of 
Hume, no one in his senses would discredit the trust- 
worthiness of the recorded history of the evangelists, 
if he supposed they were in their senses when they acted 
and wrote the doings they have left recorded. That 
they were perfectly competent to judge of the facts 
which they relate, no one will question, who sees the 
contemporaneous proofs that these sacred writers could 
have had the means of being personally conversant 
with what they describe. Moreover, it is worthy to be 
remarked, that there are four separate evangelists who 
have left their separate and independent testimony, each 
bearing its own characteristic marks of individuality of 
style, each in his place relating the most prominent 
facts of the general history, yet each in his own way 
relating some important circumstances, which, from bre- 
vity, the others omit. It is forcibly remarked by Bishop 
Wilson, in quoting a statement of Mr. T. H. Home, 
- That it is an extraordinary, but singular fact, that no 
history since the commencement of the world, has been 
written by so great a number of the friends and acquaint- 
ances of an illustrious person, as that of our Lord. 
One contemporary history is a rarity, two is a coinci- 
dence scarcely known—four is, so far as appears, un- 
paralleled. 5 ' 



SCRIPTURES. Si 

Now, in applying the principle of Hume, that there 
is no argument for the honesty of persons, so convinc- 
ing, as that which shows that the conduct ascribed to 
them was contrary to the course of natural self-interest, 
and all ordinary human motives, we may ask, how can 
the conduct of the evangelists and apostles be accounted 
for, or any other supposition, than that they were acting 
for the truth ? Here are fifteen witnesses, and eight of 
them the writers of the New Testament, relating facts 
in the presence of the people, before whom, and in the 
age in which, they are declared to have occurred. 
Would any one imagine they could be impostors, in 
such circumstances ? The case refutes itself. They 
must have had base and dishonest motives, if they 
wrote what they knew was not true. But for what 
could they practice deception % From the beginning 
they were persecuted from city to city ; they were run- 
ning against the prejudices and interests of Jews and 
heathens at every step ; they encountered contempt and 
violence wherever they went ; one after another of them 
was committed to prison, and, at length, with the single 
exception of the Apostle John — as the valid traditions 
of antiquity confirm it — every one of them suffered a 
painful and unnatural death. But from the beginning, 
in every step till the end, they persevered in the same 
self-denying and perilous testimony in behalf of the 
truths concerning Jesus and his doctrine. No one ever 
arose to say that they acted in pursuit of wealth, or 
power, or reputation, or from any time-serving motive. 
On the contrary, they took joyfully the spoiling of their 



88 CREDIBILITY OF THE 

goods, and their lot was one of poverty till the last ; 
instead of seeking honor, they encountered the contempt 
of philosophers and the prejudices of people of all 
religions ; instead of reputation, they were disgraced ; 
and when, at the tribunals of persecution, they were 
often appealed to by the officers, who could not bear to 
witness such noble sufferers perishing unjustly, and 
were besought to drop some expression which could be 
technically construed into an evasion or recantation of 
their faith, in such cases their uniform testimony was, 
" I cannot give it up ;" or as Polycarp, the disciple and 
friend of John, protested at the stake, " that he had 
served his Saviour eighty-six years, and how could he 
then, at the martyr's pile, deny his Lord and King 2" 
These suffering witnesses to the truth, could at any time 
have recanted, if they were upholding an imposture, 
which their sufferings could have left them no induce- 
ment any longer to persist in maintaining. But no 
denial or compromise was extorted from them, till the 
last of them sealed their faith with their blood. To 
maintain a sheer fabrication against such odds and 
issues as these, is contrary to the principles of human 
nature, in the face of all human experience and history. 
Nor does it abate from the force of this argument, 
that the facts thus testified to, in the face of persecu- 
tion and to the issue of death, were facts of an extra- 
ordinary and miraculous nature. They maintained their 
faith in the gospel, on the strength of these miracles, as 
among their chief evidences ; but, unless they had seen 
those miracles, how could they have thus maintained 



SCRIPTURES. 89 

the faith which was built on them ? But, if they saw 
those wonderful works, they were necessitated to believe 
the truth for the support of which those miracles were 
performed. The explanation of their faith can admit 
of no other solution. In view of such truth, supported 
by such evidence, it was said by the ancient Chrysos- 
tom, " It would be the greatest miracle of all, if the 
world believed without miracles." 

Moreover, it is to be borne in mind, that at the 
earliest period when any Jewish or heathen adversaries 
are recorded as having left any notice of Christianity, 
there appears to be no evidence of their having ques- 
tioned the recorded facts of the gospel history. In the 
earlier eras of Christian antiquity, the opposers of 
Christianity acknowledged the New Testament books 
as the real productions of their reputed authors, and 
quoted from them as such. When, for example, it is 
brought to the notice of their persecutors, by Justyn Mar- 
tyr, (who was born about A. D. 112,) that "the first 
Christians assembled on the Sunday, that the memoirs 
of the apostles were read, and that the president after- 
wards exhorted the people to the imitation of such 
excellent things," there is here an appeal to the public 
credit with which the facts of Christianity had been 
received, though still opposed and disobeyed by multi- 
tudes who had heard of them. No one had ever yet 
arisen to question or reject these facts. But, upon 
the supposition of the falsity and imposture of these 
sacred writings, which were given forth in the lifetime 
of those who admitted their authorship, there would 



90 CREDIBILITY OF THE 

have been thousands -who could, and who would have 
come forth and disclaimed and disproved those marvel- 
lous facts which were alleged to have taken place in Jeru- 
salem, and in many places where these people were 
eye-witnesses of what was passing. The exposure of 
such a monstrous imposture as that of such men as the 
apostles contriving such a scheme of doctrine, would 
have been caught up and fastened upon them by their 
contemporary enemies ; and these exposures would have 
followed the Christians wherever they were to be found, 
and would have been retailed, transmitted and repeated, 
and commented on, by all who were jealous of their 
growth and influence. Such objections would have 
been destructive weapons in the hands of Josephus and 
Tacitus, the contemporaries of the apostles, and they 
would have been part and parcel of the history of those 
times, handed down by Celsus and Porphyry, and 
Julian, and by these infidels to all other haters of Chris- 
tianity who succeeded them, from that time to this. 

Now, the fact that Josephus among the Jews, and 
Tacitus among the Eomans, admit the existence or 
occurrence of some of the principal facts on which 
Christianity is founded, writing as they did at the very 
time that the apostles themselves were writing and 
acting, is allowed by all to be evidence of their candid 
and dispassionate testimony, and of their tacit consent 
to facts which they knew they could not disprove. But 
suppose, instead of admitting these facts as historical 
verities transpiring in their own day, they had paid a 
closer attention to all the facts of the gospel history, 



SCRIPTURES. 91 

and by giving their hearts to the examination and recep- 
tion of that divine system of truth which is based on 
these facts, they had become converts and followers of 
Christ, and had confirmed their faith by suffering, and 
had sealed it with their blood ? Would the testimony 
of the Apostle Paul, with all his logic and learning, 
have been more valuable to the cause of Christianity, if 
with all his assent to the facts of the gospel, he had 
remained, till the last, the persecuting Saul of Tarsus? 
If, when he stood before his polished audience, on Mars 
Hill, at Athens, thirty years after the crucifixion, it had 
been alleged by some one of those who spent their time 
there in hearing or telling some new thing, that the story 
of the wonderful works of Christ w T as on the same foot- 
ing of absurdity with all the fables and pretended mira- 
cles, because such pretended miracles were always done 
in secrecy, or before a few interested witnesses; — but in 
the face of such an allegation, if Paul could testify that 
many of the sick who had been healed, and some of the 
dead who had been raised, were still surviving at that 
day, and if such testimony had been verified by other 
witnesses equally trustworthy, would not the philosophi- 
cal Paul have been accredited by those who thus had it 
in their power to test his statements ? But if he had 
still remained a practical unbeliever, with his knowledge 
of such stupendous facts, would there not have been 
some valid ground for suspecting, at least, his sincerity ? — 
for with such a full and personal knowledge of these 
truths, would he not be expected to embrace them ! 
When, therefore, he not only became convinced himself, 



92 CREDIBILITY OF THE 

but practically embraced tliat truth which he thus sup- 
ported, and suffered for it, and finally died for it, is this 
a ground for questioning his integrity, as a partial and 
interested witness ? 

The same irresistible conclusion attaches to the case of 
all the apostles and all the evangelists. They began with 
being strangers to Christ ; many of them were his bitter 
enemies; some of them continued, for a while, weak and 
faithless. But, when they saw the truth and embraced 
it, and lived and died for it, their testimony, under alt 
the known circumstances of the case, can be accounted 
for by no possibility, but by the actual truth of what 
they relate, and what they testified to, by such united 
and unvarying, and, finally, a dying testimony. 

There is no accounting for the unbelief of men in 
these modern times, as to the evidences of Christianity, 
but on the same principles by which many continued 
unbelievers in the apostles' days. The evidence is con- 
vincing, more than sufficient to command the assent of 
any one who knows a tithe or a fiftieth part of the facts 
in the case. But, unbelief is a disease of the heart, 
rather than of the understanding. If we should go 
into the unbounded details of this whole scheme of 
evidence ; if we were to follow up the several different 
and independent channels of historical proof, and the 
methods of illustration which a critical and candid 
attention to this vast subject would amply admit of, 
there would be enough to convince any one, a hundred 
times over, that the gospel history is a scheme of 
undoubted facts and historical verities. But how little 



SCRIPTURES. 93 

is the effect of such evidence, if we allow it only to 
lodge in our memories, or to fade away there, like 
unread characters in the books which are never taken 
down from the shelves of a library ? We cannot dis- 
prove the facts of the gospel history ; if we examine 
the subject at all, with any thoroughness, we are obliged 
to assent to the truths of Christianity. But if it is true, 
what will it be to us, if we are not saved by it ? And 
if we are lost, what will be the depth of our condemna- 
tion, if cast down from so high a privilege of knowing 
' and believing the truth ? 



CHAPTER V. 

MIRACLES. 

When we consider the Bible simply as a record of 
facts, there can be adduced for its historical integrity a 
higher and more varied order of testimony than has been 
pretended to, in behalf of any other book which has 
ever come down to us from a high antiquity. In order to 
attest its genuine and original character, we must first 
establish the proofs of its authenticity — in other words, 
that it was really written by the persons who are its 
reputed authors. The next thing in the order of proof, 
is to show that its statements are a true historical record 
of facts, or a trustworthy narrative of events as they 
occurred. This involves the credibility of the Bible. 
We have evidence of greater authority, and far more 
abundant in quantity, than can be produced for the 
most trustworthy historical book of antiquity, that those 
who lived at the times and places where the events 
related in the Bible are said to have taken place, did 
really believe and know that the recorded statements 
in the gospel history were actual facts and truths. So 
far then we are prepared to open the Bible, in order to 
receive its statements, as truths established beyond all 
reasonable question. 



MIRACLES. 95 

Section I. Definition of Miracles. 
In opening the pages of the Bible, there is at once 
presented upon its surface a frequent repetition of narra- 
tives which relate events entirely unlike anything which, 
occurs under the operation of the ordinary laws of 
nature. If they truly occurred at all, they are strictly 
supernatural. There are between forty and fifty ot 
these accounts given in the New Testament alone, with 
all the details of circumstance, besides others of the 
kind implied or referred to, in general statements. It 
is obvious, therefore, that the Bible contains records pre- 
eminently peculiar, and different from any records of 
truths found in any other well authenticated and entirely 
credible books which are received as authority among 
men. It is not only in respect to its doctrines, pro- 
mises, institutions and revelations, that this reference is 
made, but it is a reference to its recorded facts which 
occurred as events in the history of men. In other 
words, those historical events were supernatural occur- 
rences, and are, strictly speaking, to be regarded as 
miracles, if received at all. These miracles recorded 
in the Bible are so interwoven as part and parcel of 
the contents of the Scriptures, from the beginning to 
the end, that it is impossible to admit the perfect 
authenticity and credibility of those records, without 
receiving those miracles as equally well attested with all 
the other facts and narratives therein contained. They 
enter into the warp and woop of the whole texture of 
the sacred books ; and they cannot be denied, without 
denying all that is essential to the genuineness and 
integrity of these writings, 



96 MIRACLES. 

In exhibiting the proof of miracles as an attestation 
of the divine character of the Christian Scriptures, we 
must meet the subject just as it is presented, with 
whatever difficulties may have arisen as objections upon 
the very face arid front of the question. Let it then be 
clearly understood, that miracles, as they are here pre- 
sented, are not matters which can be explained away, 
by any assignable causes in the operations of nature. 
In dark ages, or among an ignorant people, many 
things may have passed as miracles, which the discove- 
ries of science have since perfectly explained. The 
falling of stones from the clouds, are now understood 
to come within the laws of meteorology and astronomy ; 
the wonders of electricity, galvanism, and of many 
chemical agencies, which may once have been regarded 
with a sense of mystery akin to superstition, are now 
known to have causes and laws in nature which will 
account for all their operations. Thus also, there are 
many other things which now seem wonderful and inex- 
plicable, which, hereafter, may be so clearly unfolded by 
investigation, that they will all be simplified and classi- 
fied according to their proper laws. 

But miracles are such deviations from the laws of 
nature, or such suspensions of them, that they can be 
accounted for in no other way, but by referring them to 
that Supreme Power which first established the course 
of nature. The power to create, implies the power to 
change or to modify ; and no one but the atheist who 
denies the existence of God, can deny that God has 
power to suspend or alter what he first created and 



MIRACLES. 97 

established. When, therefore, we adduce miracles in 
proof of a revelation, there is no more difficulty in 
receiving the evidence of miracles, than there is of 
receiving a revelation at all. And it has been well 
remarked by Dr. Olinthus Gregory, that " in fact, the 
very idea of a revelation includes that of miracles. A 
revelation cannot be made but by a miraculous interpo- 
sition of Deity." 

Sec. II. Purposes of Miracles. 

A primary inquiry which meets us, on this subject, is, 
what were the purposes intended to be accomplished by 
miracles 1 According to the definitions already given, 
miracles are not only the signs of power put forth, but 
of supernatural power. When we assert that these 
miracles are proper proofs of a divine revelation, if it 
is asked what connexion extraordinary power has with 
establishing the truth of a system of doctrine, the reply 
is, that they are the proper expressions and signatures 
of the Divine Will. If an ambassador presents him- 
self at the seat of a national government in behalf of 
a foreign country, he is expected to exhibit valid seals 
of his official appointment. When these are attested, 
beyond a doubt, the government to which he applies 
receives him as the responsible organ of the govern- 
ment which he represents. 

If God has a special communication to make to man- 
kind, it must of necessity be accompanied by such tes- 
timonials as will accredit such an extraordinary claim 
upon the attention of men. If, therefore, God possesses 
1 



98 MIKACLES. 

truth equally with his power, He would never delegate 
his power to those who would abuse it, in order to estab- 
lish falsehood, If, by any possibility, a bad man could 
instrumental ly exercise supernatural power, for attesting 
what is not the truth, this would be nothing else but 
the surrender of Divine power in favor of a bad cause. 
According to all our conceptions of the attributes of 
God, we believe it is impossible that God would ever 
permit his power to be exercised in such a manner, that 
men could not distinguish truth from falsehood, or that 
they would be under the necessity of receiving falsehood 
for the truth. 

If it is at any time related in the Scriptures, that God 
permitted wicked men to exercise miraculous and even 
prophetical powers, it is easily discernible in such cases, 
that those persons were only the instruments for exe- 
cuting the purposes of the Almighty ; and this, He has 
in some instances allowed to be done by bad men as 
well as by good men. Such cases, however, are always 
distinguishable from the proper purposes of miracles. 
When God delegates supernatural power, in order to 
attest a doctrine, those who exercise that power simply 
become the medium of a communication which does not 
reside inherently in them. So that those who are the 
instruments of using such power, do not put it forth as 
the exercise of their natural faculties, but it is the Divine 
Energy accompanying the truth declared, and as the 
visible sign of the known will of God. This was the 
appeal which the apostles constantly made to the Al- 
mighty for the divine sanction of their acts ; as, for ex- 



MIRACLES. 99 

ample, in Acts, 3 : 12, — " Ye men of Israel, why marvel 
ye at this ? or why look ye so earnestly on us, as though 
by our own power or holiness we have made this man 
to walk?'' The act, in such a case, was strictly the act 
of God put forth in connexion with the accompanying 
sign or declaration of the man who was employed as 
the agent. So that the apostles, in this case, really could 
be no more said to perform miracles, than any other 
men of their own day, or any other men now. It was 
God who directed the power, and caused it to be acted 
through his servants, for healing diseases, raising the 
dead, or for any other design of benevolence, and thereby 
signifying his approbation of whatever truth should be 
spoken by those thus invested with the testimonials of 
his authority. 

There are only two conditions, on which any question 
can be raised, as to whether we can legitimately give our 
full belief to an alleged miraculous interposition in be- 
half of man. The one is, as to the possibility of such 
miraculous power being exerted. But all who believe 
in the existence of that Divine Power which created all 
things, and ordained the laws of nature, must admit 
that the same power can suspend or alter the laws 
which it ordained. The other condition for our belief in 
miracles, is whether there was a sufficient 'reason, or an 
adequate occasion, for such exercise of supernatural inter- 
position. 

Now there has always existed amongst the wisest and 
the most inflecting men — even before the Christian era — 
a deep conviction, that there was a necessity for some 



100 MIRACLES. 

Divine intervention in behalf of men. The most far- 
sighted among the heathen, acknowledged that there 
were no means among men for removing the miseries 
into which the race had fallen. Plato, who fully com- 
prehended all the wisdom which had been gathered up 
at his day, acknowledged that nothing could be dis- 
covered for removing the vices and miseries of mankind, 
and advised his disciples to wait patiently till a Reve- 
lation should be given. Mankind are naturally ignorant 
of the will of God, even when they admit His existence; 
they know nothing of a future state, or of the means 
by which, as sinners, they may attain to the Divine fa- 
vour. But from all the other indications of God's wis- 
dom and benevolence, it would be reasonable to pre- 
sume that some method would be disclosed by which 
man might be placed in a position answerable to his 
nature and his destiny. In such a case, if God should 
hold communication with his creatures, it must have 
been by such supernatural indications of his immediate 
or personal agency, as would make it to be clearly the 
work of Divine authority. And if God had a settled 
purpose in establishing the order of nature, he could, in 
view of other and higher purposes, change that pre- 
viously settled order for such sufficient reasons. 

"When, therefore, we take into account the character 
and attributes of God, as they appear even in his works, 
and then acknowledge that provision was to be made 
for the necessities of man as a moral and immortal be- 
ing, there is at once presented an adequate occasion of 
attesting such a moral and gracious revelation, by ere- 



MIRACLES. 101 

dentials that will leave no doubt of the immediate inter- 
position of the Almighty. But for any purposes which 
could be accomplished simply by such means as are 
found in the ordinary course of nature, there would be 
a legitimate presumption against miracles. For miracles 
would be uncalled for in doing what man might do, by 
powers within himself. But the case is placed on entire- 
ly different grounds, when an occasion is presented out 
of the range of nature, and when there is visibly in- 
troduced the agency of God, who is the lawgiver and 
Lord over nature. 

It is on these simple grounds that miracles attest the 
divine authority of Revelation. And while they attest 
the authority, they are equally fitted to evince the nature 
of that revelation. Thus, for example, the chief avowed 
purpose of the gospel, was to proclaim forgiveness of 
sins. The scribes questioned Christ's authority to forgive 
sins ; and accordingly Jesus manifested a visible sign 
that he was commissioned to exercise that Divine pre- 
rogative. On one occasion, therefore, among many others 
of the kind, it is said, * " And Jesus knowing their 
thoughts, said, Wherefore think ye evil in your hearts ? 
For whether is it easier to say, Thy sins be forgiven thee ; 
or to say, arise and walk ? But that ye may know that 
the son of God hath power on earth to forgive sins — 
(then saith he to the sick of the palsy), Arise, take up thy 
bed, and go into thine house. And he arose, and de- 
parted unto his house. But when the multitude saw it, 

Matt. 9: 4—8. 



102 MIRACLES. 

they marvelled, and glorified God, who had given such 
power to men." 

Moreover, as the revelation which is thus attested by 
miracles was mainly directed to removing the effects of 
sin, the application of that supernatural power extended 
chiefly to such evils as would evince the suitableness of 
the provisions of the gospel. Diseases are the effects of 
sin ; and therefore, by the removal of diseases, there was 
a visible assurance that all evils, natural and moral, 
could be removed by the same Divine power. The cast- 
ing out of demoniacal possessions was a sensible demon- 
stration that Christ was the physician of souls, and that 
he could destroy the power of the devil. Death is the 
effect of sin; and in order to show that Christ was the 
Lord of life and the conqueror of death. " he brought 
life and immortality to light," by raising into renewed 
vitality, some who had fallen into the embrace of death- 
Thus while actually exerting his omnipotent power, he 
proclaimed the doctrine, that he had all life in himself; 
and he said, "Marvel not at this ; for the hour is com- 
ing in the which all who are in the graves shall hear 
his voice and come forth " When our Lord gave his last 
commission to his disciples to go into all the world and 
preach the gospel to every creature, his sanction is thus 
attested,* — "So then after the Lord had spoken unto 
them, he was received up into heaven, and sat on the 
right hand of God. And they went forth and preached 

Mark. 16: 19, 20, 



MIRACLES. 103 

everywhere, the Lord working with them, and confirm- 
ing the Word with signs following." 

From the beginning to the end of his personal minis- 
try, in answer to every cavil and objection which his ene- 
mies raised, our Lord simply stated his doctrine and 
appealed to his miracles, in such sayings as these, and 
which were often repeated : " If I do not the works of 
my Father, believe me not. But if I do. though ve be- 
lieve me not, believe the works." And again : "Believe 
me, that I am in the Father and the Father in me ; or 
else believe me for the very work's sake." From this 
brief summary of evidence, it appears that the chief 
purpose of miracles was to attest the commission of 
those who bore a Divine Revelation to men. And thus 
the doctrines of the gospel are accredited by the pre- 
vious announcements of prophecy, verified through su- 
pernatural miracles , and wrought by Christ and his 
apostles ; and such miracles at that time were regarded, 
as they have been ever since, as the sign manual of a 
system of truth emanating from the only living and 
true God. We have thus considered the purposes 
intended to be accomplished by miracles. 

Sec. III. Credibility of Miracles. 

We may now proceed to notice the proofs for the 
credibility of those miracles which are recorded in the 
Bible. 

The miracles which are described in the New Testa- 
ment, as facts, were set forth at the time of their occur- 
rence, and by those who wrought or recorded them, as 



104 MIRACLES. 

things obviously and notoriously different from anything 
that had ever transpired in the ordinary course of nature. 
They were miracles or they were nothing. To feed five 
thousand men by the reproduction of sufficient food, 
from what at first was only five loaves and two fishes ; 
to heal persons born blind, and give them perfect sight 
by a touch, and sometimes only by a word ; to cure the 
most inveterate diseases, at a great distance off, simulta- 
neously with the word of command ; to raise up a dead 
man from the bier on which he was borne to the sepul- 
chre, and to call forth into life one who had been lying 
in the grave four days ; to walk on the sea, as on a 
pavement, and again to calm the rolling waves, and 
silence the storm into perfect stillness, and all done in- 
stantly, with the word of command ; these were events 
which no coloring could overdraw or exaggerate, simply 
as a description of any remarkable operations of nature. 
Nor, were there simply a few cases of this kind. 
There are between forty and fifty instances detailed in 
the New Testament, besides a great number and variety 
which are summed up in such general descriptions as 
these :* " And Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching 
in their synagogues and preaching the gospel of the 
kingdom, and healing all manner of sickness, and all 
manner of disease among the people. And his fame 
went throughout all Syria ; and they brought unto him 
all sick people that were taken with divers diseases and 
torments, and those which were possessed with devils, 

* Matt, 4 : 23, 24. 



MIRACLES. 105 

and those which were lunatic, and those that had the 
palsy ; and he healed them." The historian John twice 
mentions, towards the close of his narrative, to this 
effect — u And many other signs truly did Jesus in the 
presence of his disciples, which are not written in this 
book."* Concerning the apostles, besides the many 
cases of miracles which are minutely described, there are 
such general attestations as this : f " There came also a 
multitude out of the cities round about Jerusalem, 
bringing sick folks and them that were vexed with un- 
clean spirits ; and they were healed, every one." 

Now these miracles continued to be performed till 
the time when the last of the apostles disappeared, a 
period of at least seventy years from the first marvellous 
works wrought by Jesus Christ. These miracles of the 
Christian Scriptures were generally performed in the 
most public manner, sometimes in the temple, now in 
the streets, then on the open plains and by the river 
side, and before all classes and great numbers of specta- 
tors. On other occasions, as if to give opportunity for 
a more minute inspection than could be given in a crowd, 
there were some of the most remarkable miracles 
wrought in private dwellings, under the close observa- 
tion of those who had the greatest interest in knowing- 
all the particulars. In nearly all of these cases, instead 
of being prepared for the occasion, or having any pre- 
vious notice of what was required, the most numerous 
and astonishing effects of miraculous power were put 

* John 20: 30. t Acts 5 : 16. 



106 MIRACLES. 

forth instantaneously in each instance, as it unexpect^ 
edly arose. 

There is no intimation, by friend or by foe, that any 
miracle was ever attempted which was not perfect and 
complete. And what characterized nearly every recorded 
case, was, that it was witnessed by those whose hostility 
gave them every inducement to exercise the closest 
scrutiny. They had the use of their senses to detect 
every feature of the case. It was not the discussion of 
doctrines — which would require the exercise and ab- 
straction of the mental faculties — but is was offering to 
the sight, and hearing, and touch of men, what could be 
investigated by the plainest intellect, as well as by the 
most profound philosopher. 

Now, at the very time and place where these mira- 
cles were wrought, there was a present and public 
appeal made to the whole contemporaneous population, 
by those who wrought or reported these cases. An 
example of this may be seen in the preaching of the 
apostles at Jerusalem, fifty days after the ascension of 
Christ : " Ye men of Israel, hear these words : Jesus of 
Nazareth, a man approved by God among you, by 
miracles, and wonders, and signs, which God did by him 
in the midst of you, as ye yourselves also know." — 
These miracles were wrought for an avowed attestation 
of the authenticity of a religion which was proclaimed 
as having the purpose of overthrowing every other exist- 
ing religion, however strongly entrenched those reli- 
gions might be in the affections of the people. They 
thus encountered the prejudices of every class, the 



MIRACLES. 107 

philosophical Romans, the bigoted Pharisees ; and they 
were put at variance with the interests of every class of 
priesthood and profession. At the same time, there is 
indubitable evidence that those simple-minded and holy 
men, whose consistency of character never betrayed 
itself, were incapable of managing a concerted arrange- 
ment, in the presence of such ingenious scrutiny, so 
long continued, and in the presence of such a multi- 
tude of witnesses. Each acted his part in his own 
characteristic way ; and each recorded history bears 
the inimitable marks of a narrative written without the 
consciousness of what was recorded by others. 

Any one can see, that when these mighty works were 
done, and these recorded accounts of them were pub- 
lished, there would have been the immediate signal for 
fastening the charge of deception, collusion or manage- 
ment upon the apostles, if any flaw could have been 
detected by that keen-sighted generation. The pressure 
of persecution, both Jewish and Pagan, would have 
supplied the strongest motive for any apostate to give 
his testimony against these miracles, to the opponents 
of Christianity then living. When one of the apostles 
who had witnessed the miracles of our Lord, at length 
revealed the concealed treachery which had followed 
him in all his intercourse with his Master, there was 
then the fitting time and place to disclose any secret 
management which, it it had existed, must have been 
known to one who was in all the secrets of the other 
apostles. But when other false witnesses had been 
sworn to bear testimony against our Lord at his trial. 



108 MIRACLES. 

Judas, whose conscience had been beguiled by the 
reward for his treachery, now felt its returning* stings, 
and in the face of his employers, whose wrath could 
have crushed him, made the confession which he could 
no longer restrain : " I have sinned, in that I have 
betrayed the innocent blood. * * * And he cast down 
the pieces of silver in the temple and departed, and 
went and hanged himself."* 

Thus we have the admission and the suffrage of the 
whole Jewish nation, and multitudes of others from the 
polished contemporaneous witnesses present with them, 
that these marvellous works occurred as they are re- 
corded. There were many critical writers living at the 
same time with the apostles, whose interest it was to 
have appealed to the world, and to have recorded their 
testimony against the credit of the Christian miracles, 
if any defect of evidence in their favor had been known 
in that generation. Josephus wrote his books on the 
antiquities of the Jews and the affairs of his own people, 
in that generation, before some of the later books in 
the New Testament were written. He records and con- 
firms some of the most important historical events 
which enter into the records of the New Testament. 
With all his learning, criticism and knowledge of his 
own times, he yet chose to remain a Jew ; but he 
allows his whole nation, and all that existing generation, 
to bear their solemn testimony that there was no fallacy 
in any of the wonderful works then proclaimed as 

*Matt. 27; 4,5 



MIRACLES. 109 

wrought by Christ and his apostles. The writings of Jose- 
phus have passed down through the hands of the Jews, by 
whom they have always been prized as of the highest 
value ; and the channels of history, Jewish, Christian and 
secular, have preserved uu mutilated the faithful records of 
the times of the apostles. After Josephus, the Jewish 
rabbis, in their national Talmuds, expressly mention and 
acknowledge the miracles of our Saviour and the apos- 
tles ; but while admitting the facts, they attempt to 
explain them away, by assigning the miracles of Jesus 
to the powers of magic, and by the use of certain 
enchanted words which, they alleged, Jesus stole from 
the temple. 

The first great infidel writer whose fragmentary works 
have been preserved, and who speaks of Christianity, 
was Celsus, who was born about A. D. 175. He not 
only admits the authentic character of the sacred Scrip- 
tures, but also their general credibility ; he distinctly 
acknowledges that Christ performed miracles ; and that 
it was on the credit of these miracles he gained the 
most of his disciples. But while he does not deny, and 
even admits the miracles, he pretended that our Lord 
learned the magical arts for performing them, in Egypt.* 
The testimony of Porphyry, Hierocles, and other suc- 
cessive infidel writers, whose testimony is known to us, 
during the third and fourth centuries, is to the same 
effect. But the most powerful of all those early ene- 
mies of Christianity was the Roman Emperor Julian, 

* Lardner, IV. 120-130. 



110 MIRACLES. 

In addition to his own acuteness and learning, his un- 
bounded power and resources as the emperor of the all- 
embracing Koman dominion, placed at his service all 
the learning which his wealth could encourage or his 
power command. 

In the year A. D. 361, he published his own work 
against Christianity. But while he concedes the au- 
thorship of the Christian books, he does not deny the 
credibility of the universally attested Christian mira- 
cles. He only slights and disparages them, by such 
expressions as may be seen in these extracts : "Jesus, 
who, while he rebuked the winds, and walked on 
the seas and cast out demons, and, as you will have 
it, made the heavens and the earth." Again he says : 
" Jesus has been celebrated about three hundred years, 
having done nothing in his lifetime worthy of remem- 
brance, unless any one thinks it a mighty matter to heal 
lame and blind people, and exorcise demoniacs in the 
villages of Bethsaida and Bethany." * But these 
Christian books, whose authenticity is conceded from 
Josephus and other contemporaries hostile to Chris- 
tianity, all down through the first four centuries of the 
Christian era, have come to us unscathed and unmuti- 
lated by any other contradictory and conflicting testi- 
mony. Their records bear, upon the face of them, the 
adequate and assignable cause for the wide- spread repu- 
tation of Christianity at so early a period after its first 
publication. It was the conviction of the truth of 

Lardner's Heathen Testimony, chap. 46. 



MIRACLES. Ill 

those recorded miracles that gave such universal cur- 
rency to the Scriptures, and the unbounded progress 
and propagation of Christianity. It was that well- 
founded belief alone, and on evidence so thoroughly 
attested, that can account for the wonderful progress of 
Christianity in the face of such formidable obstacles. 
All the human instrumentalities brought to bear for 
the furtherance of the gospel, were of the weakest and 
humblest kind. Wealth, power, ingenuity and perse- 
cution sought to suppress the religion which was estab- 
lished by its crucified Founder and his obscure and 
unpretending followers. But the miraculous display of 
divine power which had attested the truth of Christi- 
anity, carried irresistible conviction to those genera- 
tions who had the original sources of evidence in their 
own hands and under their own eyes. Such causes of 
conviction passed at once into the public judgment of 
the world, and the facts on which those convictions 
were founded, thenceforward became commemorated by 
memorials and institutions, which have come down, in 
an unbroken series, from that age to this. 

The proofs for the credibility of the Christian miracles 
can be disproved by no known means of human contri- 
vance. The rejection of them is against all the known 
principles of human nature, and against all the testi- 
mony of valid history. Here we see a company of Chris- 
tian disciples, the personal followers of Jesus, each in his 
own characteristic method of narrative, testifying to a 
multitude of miracles, so public and notorious, that they 
appeal to the evidence of the senses of all the men of 



112 MIRACLES. 

their own generation. They offer to the inspection of 
those who were their contemporary witnesses, foes a s 
well as friends, the proof that these cases of superna- 
tural interposition occurred in those very places and 
times. These mighty works were continued, with more 
or less frequency, for the period of seventy years. ISTo 
work of miraculous agency was ever gainsayed as an 
unsuccessful attempt ; and with this personal testimony, 
borne in the presence of that living generation, they 
challenged universal acceptance for the truths they pro- 
claimed. No one, then or now, could suspect these 
Christian witnesses of being actuated by fanatical pas- 
sions or personal interest. They became humble and 
courageous men in advocating the truths they bore in 
their hearts and published to the world. From being 
timid and fickle in their early discipleship, they now 
bore up with an undying fortitude in testifying to the 
truths of Jesus and his doctrines. Wealth they shunned, 
power they willingly relinquished, honor they found only 
in dying for the truths they proclaimed. And yet these 
humble men persuaded multitudes in several nations 
of that age, to become willing to bear persecution and 
suffering in maintaining a course of holy living, on the 
belief of the same miracles, and of the doctrines which 
those miracles attested. And all this was against all the 
prejudice, pride, interest and power of Jews and Ko- 
mans, against subtle philosophy and political opposition. 
All this time they were suffering for a system of truth, 
which, if it had been subject to a single example of 
falsity, would have been taken up by enemies and borne 



MIRACLES. 113 

onward to the latest ages, by those who had every 
interest in exposing the falsehood. 

This case of the Christian evidences, stands perfectly 
unparalleled in the history of the world. Xo false 
religion ever pretended to the witness of numerous 
public miracles, to accredit the origin and authenticity 
of its claims. Every recorded instance of a religious 
system, besides Christianity, had its origin in fraud, 
fanaticism, priestcraft, or military and political power. If 
they ever claimed the aid of oracles or supernatural 
miracles, it was not till after the system was established, 
and opposition could be frowned down by bribe or 
power. It was the prevalence of the system which after- 
wards gave currency to the pretended miraculous sto- 
ries ; but it was never the appeal to miracles which 
gave the first credit and currency to the system. The 
imposture of Mohammed was established some six cen- 
turies after Christianity; but it was not till Mohammed- 
anism itself had been established for some six centuries 
after its introduction, that its writers and advocates ever 
ventured to assert any supernatural evidence of miracles 
as being publicly witnessed in its favor. Mohammed was 
tempted and solicited by his personal followers to give 
some evidence of miraculous interposition in his favor. 
But such a risk he never ventured. In the Koran, there are 
admissions like these : " Nothing hindered us from send- 
ing thee, with miracles, except that the former nations 
have charged them with imposture. * * * They say, 
unless a sign be sent down unto him from his Lord, 



114 MIRACLES. 

we will not believe ; answer, signs are in the power of 
God alone, and I am no more than a public teacher. 
Is it not sufficient for them that we have sent down 
unto them the book of Koran, to be read unto them V 
But in that dark age and country in which Mohammed 
appeared, notwithstanding his disavowal, at the begin- 
ning of his career, of a public appeal to miracles, his 
duplicity was evinced by afterwards giving out, that he 
was the subject of supernatural communications while 
concealed from the public view. After a lapse of some 
ten years, when he had gained a footing of military 
and political power, and he began to carry his religion 
with the sword at the van of conquering armies, he 
was fraudulent enough to pretend to a divine mission, 
by appealing to the evidence of the very miracles which 
he had disclaimed in the Koran, and which no one 
ever professed to have witnessed but himself. 

Sec. IV. Miracles are to be received on testimony. 

The recorded miracles of the New Testament afford 
us the same evidence of the divine character of the 
religion which they attest, as was afforded to the origi- 
nal witnesses of them. It is at once consistent with 
the economy and course of nature and providence, 
that instead of repeating miracles for every individual 
or body of people, from age to age, God should have 
commissioned a few selected messengers, who should 
furnish their testimony for all other times and countries. 
If it had been required that miracles should have been 



MIRACLES. 115 

repeated from age to age, they would cease to be mira- 
cles ; their power to affect the mind would be lost, 
and instead of being supernatural, they would, by 
their regular and frequent repetition, have come to be 
a part of the settled system and order of things. 

Notwithstanding all this, ever since the publication 
of Hume's infidel fallacy, the hope of the revilers of 
Christianity has rested upon maintaining his argument, 
which may be thus briefly stated in his own words. 
He says : " Our belief of any fact attested by eye-wit- 
nesses, rests upon our experience of the usual conformity 
of facts to the reports of witnesses. But a firm and 
unalterable experience has established the laws of nature. 
When, therefore, witnesses attest any fact which is a 
violation of the laws of nature, here is a contest of two 
opposite experiences. The proof against a miracle, 
from the very nature of the fact, is as entire as any 
argument can be imagined; and if so, it cannot be sur- 
mounted by a proof from testimony, because testimony 
rests upon experience." The fallacy of this compound- 
ed system of sophisms, needs only to be stated, to be 
refuted. By this method, the objector would deny to 
himself and to all men, any certain knowledge except 
what may be derived through his own personal senses. 
He denies the principle on which any and all testimony 
is of any value. For, there is a fundamental principle 
in our nature, on which we intuitively receive all testi- 
mony which has the appropriate marks of credibility. 
When we find that the witness has every means of 



116 MIRACLES. 

knowing his facts, and are satisfied as to his compe- 
tency to judge with accuracy, and have no reason to 
distrust him on account of any supposed prejudice, 
passion or private interest, and find this testimony con- 
firmed by repeated and manifold coincidences with 
many other sources of independent testimony, then, 
in view of such testimony, it is as much a law 
of our nature and our experience, to accredit it, as 
it is to rely on the regularity of what we see in 
the physical world around us. Besides this, if tes- 
timony cannot prove a miracle, it can prove nothing. 
There is as strong evidence in the attested miracles of 
Christ and his apostles, as there is of any other opera- 
tions in the course of nature, at that period of the 
world when the miracles of the New Testament are 
related to have occurred. We know of the past opera- 
tions of nature only by testimony, and by inference as 
to the regularity of its laws ; and we know of the 
actual occurrence of historical miracles by the same 
laws of testimony. 

Now, when we take into account the adequate reasons 
why miracles should have been wrought, and the evi- 
dence of their necessity for the purposes they were 
intended to serve, we have as much ground to presume 
that God should have wrought miracles in connexion 
with the coming of Christ, as that he should keep up 
the regular order of nature as we see it in our own 
time. There is no propriety, therefore, in saying that 
miracles are against our experience, as that experience 
coincides with the settled order of visible nature. For 
if we give up our confidence in testimony, then we 



MIRACLES. 117 

know nothing of what the order or course of nature 
was, at any given period before each of us was individu- 
ally born. And, doubtless, the operations of nature 
must have been different from what they are now, when 
the author of nature had different or peculiar purposes 
to accomplish. Testimony declares that miracles have 
occurred ; and it is testimony bearing such marks of 
credibility, that every rightly constituted mind is so 
formed as intuitively to receive it. There are no legiti- 
mate grounds of suspicion, either for our distrusting the 
means of knowledge, or the competency or the honesty 
of those who reported or recorded these miracles. And 
there is abundant reason to believe that there was an 
adequate necessity and a proper occasion for working 
those miracles. 

Such testimony cannot be discredited unless we dis- 
credit the laws of the human constitution, and cut 
loose from all the sources of knowledge beyond our 
present senses. Now, while we believe the testimony 
of those who have reported those miracles, it is also 
declared by divine testimony that those miracles attest 
the authority of the religion of which they are the 
seals. We cannot recede from these principles nor 
disclaim them, without launching into universal unbelief, 
and consenting to the " fool who hath said in his heart 
there is no God." 

We have evidence all sufficient, and more than suffi- 
cient, for the truth of those doctrines and disclosures 
which are presented in the Christian Scriptures. We 
have an accumulation of evidence in our day, which has 



11& MIRACLES. 

been gathering up ever since the days of the apostles. 
We are shut up to the faith of the gospel. Whatever 
it says of us, and of all men, will assuredly prove true. 
If we reject the counsel of God against ourselves, it had 
been better for us never to have been born. And if we 
receive not this testimony, that will be true of us, which 
our Lord said of some, in his own generation — "If 
they hear not these, neither will they be persuaded 
though one rose from the dead." 



CHAPTER VI. 



PROPHECY. 



There are two leading and peculiar methods for 
attesting the divine authority of the religion contained 
in the Old and New Testaments. The one is by mira- 
cles ; the other is by prophecy. In the preceding chap- 
ter the argument from miracles was exhibited, by ex- 
amining the proofs of the authorship of the New Testa- 
ment books, and the credibility of the facts therein 
narrated. The testimony of the New Testament was 
shown to be supported by contemporary evidence, thus 
proving that those supernatural narratives which form 
so large a part of the New Testament history, were 
actual facts, which no one ever denied in the times and 
pla6es where those events occurred. From internal 
evidence,-^ well as from various collateral proofs, it 
becomes morally impossible, in view of the known 
principles of human nature and the laws of human 
testimony, for the accounts of the New Testament mira- 
cles to be consistently regarded as misrepresentations 
and fabrications. 

We now proceed to apply the same methods of 
proof to the argument from prophecy. The author- 
ship of the books of the Old Testament, as well as the 



120 PROPHECY. 

trustworthiness of its facts and predictions, while sup- 
ported by evidence peculiar to themselves, also stand 
on the credit and authority of the New Testament. For 
the New Testament constantly appeals to the authority 
of the Old ; it recognizes the doctrines, institutions and 
predictions of those ancient Scriptures, as the grounds 
on which the authority of Christianity is based; and 
those ancient records are constantly appealed to, for the 
proofs of their verification and fulfilment by Christ and 
his apostles. 

Section I. Nature and design of Prophecy. 

1. The first step in this examination, is to show, that 
the Old Testament Scriptures were knoivn to be extant 
many centuries before the specific predictions contained 
in them were fulfilled. We can here allude only to a 
single method of proof, which, however, will be a suffi- 
cient specimen, for the purpose of attesting the inspired 
authorship of the Old Testament books. 

The ancient Jewish Talmuds and commentaries en- 
able us to attest the literal genuineness of the writings 
of the Old Testament, from the several periods when 
they were successively published ; and we have thus 
furnished to our hand, a method of authenticating those 
several books, much resembling those tests of criticism 
by which, in a former chapter, we saw how the author- 
ship of the New Testament books was so conclusively 
proved. The ancient as well as the modern Jews, were 
always actuated by an extraordinary religious fidelity, 
and a singularly jealous criticism, in transcribing and 



PROPHECY. 121 

reproducing copies of their sacred books. There are 
rules contained in their Talmuds which throw suffi- 
cient light upon the copying and translation of the Old 
Testament, to convince us, that there never could have 
been any material mistakes in the transmission of those 
books. The perfection of the parchments on which they 
wrote ; the elegance and accuracy of the handwriting ; 
the minuteness of the rules in what w T ere called the 
Masoretic Tables, for counting the pages, lines, words 
and letters in every manuscript ; the penalties by which 
mistakes would be punished, — in a word, the whole 
system of rules and apparatus for criticism, by which the 
transmission of those ancient Scriptures was guarded 
against any corruption in the text, — all agree in de- 
termining the authorship and literal genuineness of the 
Old Testament beyond any reasonable suspicion, in 
periods long preceding the beginning of the Christian 
dispensation. 

An example of the method of authenticating the Old 
Testament books, may be witnessed in the case of the 
Samaritan Pentateuch, or version of the first five books 
of the Old Testament, which was separately published 
some five hundred years before the advent of Christ. 
The occasion of its publication was the following. When 
the principal part of the Jewish nation had been re- 
moved into Babylon, the population who took their 
places in Samaria and the northern portions of Pales- 
tine, were people whom the king of Assyria placed 
there, and encouraged to practise idolatry. But shortly 
after that act of the Assyrian king, Manasseh, a descen- 



122 PROPHECY. 

dant of Aaron, in order to overcome the prevailing idol- 
atry, caused copies of the Pentateuch, or the five books 
of Moses, to be extensively introduced among the people; 
and by these and other means, the people soon renounced 
their idolatry ; and being a mixed race, partly Jewish, 
they were thenceforward called Samaritans. But these 
books were not written in the Chaldaic Hebrew, in 
which language the received ancient Hebrew Scriptures 
were known to the genuine Jews, in the time of Ezra ; 
but they were written in the Old Samaritan character, 
and in that version they were always preserved and 
transmitted by the Samaritan people. These people 
erected a temple to Jehovah on Mount Gerizim ; and 
there they always maintained their worship and their 
sacred laws, in opposition to the Jewish worship at Je- 
rusalem after the restoration of the Jews from their 
captivity in Babylon. The mutual jealousy thence result- 
ing, accounts for the fact, in the history of our Saviour, 
that " the Jews had no dealings with the Samaritans." 
Between these two rival people, there were maintained 
separate and independent versions of the oldest books of 
the sacred writings — the one in the old Samaritan lan- 
guage, the other in our received Hebrew. Here then 
we find a twofold method of verifying the historical 
existence of the five large books of Moses, called the 
Pentateuch, at a period of five hundred years before the 
Christian era. The mutual incentives to accuracy in the 
critical preservation of those books, were not amongst 
the least of those methods which providence overruled 
for the preservation of the sacred text. But when the 



PROPHECY. 12S 

sacred canon of the books of Moses is settled, the pro- 
cess for authenticating the remaining Hebrew Scriptures 
is visibly conspicuous by all the land-marks of the history 
of that people. 

After the time of Moses, the rive books of Moses and 
all the other sacred writings were incorporated and pre- 
served among the Jewish records, in such a manner, that 
no question can arise to impair the credit of their genu- 
ineness. The historical books, such as Joshua, Judges, 
the books of Samuel, the Kings and the Chronicles, were 
recorded amongst the state papers, as well as the sacred 
archives of the nation : they entered into the texture of 
its whole political history. The Psalms and the more 
ancient prophecies were recited in the daily worship of 
the temple, and from the times of Ezra, they were freely 
circulated in the synagogues all over the land. The con- 
temporaneous prophecies, and those after the time of 
Malachi, were recorded and copied under the supervi- 
sion of those rules, by which the scribes, who were the 
class of professional copyists, were effectually guarded 
against any corruption of the written text. Such is a 
brief reference to the authorship of all the books of the 
Old Testament, as they have come down to us through 
the received version of the ancient Hebrew Scriptures. 

The Old Testament Scriptures, according to the ancient 
Hebrew text, were translated into the Greek language, 
at Alexandria, about two hundred and eighty years be- 
fore Christ, under the supposed auspices of Ptolemy 
Philadelphus. Thus we have what is called the Septua- 
gint version of the Old Testament in Greek, running 



124 PROPHECY. 

parallel with the original Hebrew Scriptures, for nearly 
three centuries before the Christian era. 

During all that period of five hundred years, from the 
date of the Samaritan version of the books of Moses, 
already referred to, there was the keenest critical jeal- 
ousy amongst the several rival sects, in watching over 
the preservation of their sacred books. At a later age, 
the Sadducees and the Pharisees became rivals for in- 
fluence, and opponents to each other, in interpreting the 
received Scriptures ; and while each was eager for repu- 
tation and authority, they mutually guarded each other, 
and all others besides themselves, from any alterations 
in what were known to be the received books of the 
nation. Thus the Samaritans and the Jews were con- 
jointly concerned for the accuracy of their respective 
versions of the five oldest books of the Old Testament. 
As to all the books of a later date, there was the uni- 
versal testimony of each successive age, for each book 
as it was written ; and from the date of writing each 
book, respectively, the catalogue of the received sacred 
writings was unvarying, according to the order of their 
names and authors. It is a conclusive fact, on this point, 
that the Jewish historian, Josephus, who lived in the 
first century of the Christian era, has left in his published 
works, the catalogue of the books of the Old Testament, 
as it had come down to his day, upon the sanction and 
authority of the Jewish nation, through all its preceding- 
stages. The names, numbers and characters of those 
ancient Hebrew books, as attested by Josephus, agree 
precisely with the Old Testament as we have received it. 



PROPHECY. 125 

The earliest opponents to Christianity, who lived 
within the first three centuries of its history, never pre- 
tended to question the authenticity of the Old Testa- 
ment books, with the single exception of the "book of 
Daniel. But though modern infidels have followed the 
example of the ancient infidel, Porphyry, of the third 
century, who would not acknowledge the authenticity 
of the prophecy of Daniel, because the authenticity of 
that book would witness too closely the fulfilment of 
prophecy, their futile attempts are forever neutralized 
by the testimony of Josephus. He bears witness that 
the prophecy of Daniel had been received till his day, 
as one of the greatest of the genuine Old Testament 
prophecies. Down to his time, this sacred waiting had 
always been accredited by the Jewish nation, as an in- 
tegral part of the canonical Scriptures. Such is a sum- 
mary of the evidence for the Old Testament books, which 
have been received as authentic during the fourteen or 
fifteen centuries from the time when Moses composed 
his books, till the time when Christ came to fulfil the 
prophecies concerning himself. 

2. The next step in this examination, is to show the 
inspiration of the ancient Prophets, It is a sufficient 
evidence of the divine delegation of the prophets, that 
they were commissioned with miraculous power to attest 
their appointment, in the same way and for the same 
purpose, by which Christ and his apostles wrought 
miracles to accredit the divine authority of the New 
Testament dispensation. The gift and testimony of 
miracles formed reason enough with the ancient people 



126 PROPHECY. 

of God for accrediting the messages of the prophets, 
and for holding and preserving as sacred those inspired 
books in which these prophecies were recorded. And 
as no opposing claims were ever set up by any others 
who attempted to profess and prove themselves to be 
the prophets of the Lord, there was from the beginning 
every accredited proof, that those prophecies which are 
recorded in the Old Testament, were as the voice of 
God speaking to the people of those times, and to all 
coming ages of the world. 

The belief and expectation which consequently gained 
ground among each generation as it arose, entered more 
and more intimately into the received worship and the 
prayers of God's people ; so that we find, from the time 
of Malachi onward, there came to pass a general and a 
universally national interpretation of the preceding pro- 
phecies which required a fulfilment in the Messiah, who, 
when he came, was to be the hope and salvation of the 
people. 

3. Having seen that the endowment of miracles was 
the proper attestation of the inspiration of the ancient 
prophets, and was so regarded by those who received 
their messages, our next step is to show the relation of 
prophecy to the revealed religion contained in the Bible. 
This brings before us the direct evidence of the divine 
authority and inspiration of the prophecies. A prophecy 
differs from a miracle as to the effect and impressiveness 
of its immediate evidence. A miracle is an appeal to the 
senses, and when unquestionably attested, is equally 
convincing to the plainest capacity as well as to a mind 



PROPHECY. 127 

stored with learning and profound in reflection. The 
immediate impression of a miracle, is as a display of 
omnipotence ; and the performance of such a superna- 
tural work brings the beholder, as it were, into the 
personal presence of the Almighty Jehovah. And there- 
fore, in the particular age when miracles were called for, 
to attest the authority of the religion which was estab- 
lished by them, nothing could so well seal and accredit 
the mission of those employed to reveal it, as the wonder- 
ful works which they were empowered and delegated to 
perform. 

But for other ages and distant times, another kind of 
evidence would be needed to exhibit the signature of 
God's authority upon that religion which he had re- 
vealed. This was accomplished by means of the predic- 
tion and fulfilment of prophecy ; and in this way God 
attests at once his universal and co-operating omniscience 
and omnipotence — his omniscience, in foreseeing and 
disclosing future events — and his omnipotence, in con- 
trolling the operations of nature so as to bring about 
the decisions of his will. It is not to gratify the vain 
curiosity of man, nor to indulge the disposition so 
peculiar to our nature, to pry into the future ; nor is it 
to yield to man any arbitrary demand which he may 
make for some supernatural proof of God's authority ; 
but the whole scheme of prophecy is designed to display 
the perfections of God, and to show that he maintains 
a particular and universal providence over all his creatures. 

We may see what effect the evidence of prophecy was 
fitted to have, when, in the days of our Lord, his disci- 
ples and contemporaries witnessed the immediate proofs 



128 PROPHECY. 

of its fulfilment. Thus, for example, at Christ's trium- 
phal entry into Jerusalem, there were many things 
brought about and fulfilled together, or in quick succes- 
sion, which had stood recorded in prophecy for many 
centuries. At the precise moment, indeed, the people 
did not see the fulfilment, nor did they, till it was over ; 
but then, as in similar other instances, it is added, 
" These things understood not the disciples, at the first ; 
but when Jesus was glorified, then remembered they 
that these things were written of him, and that they 
had done these things unto him." * 

When the predisposing power of God is thus verified, 
in a multitude of cases, by a minute fulfilment of a con- 
nected and complicated order of prophecies, dating from 
the beginning of God's visible government over men, 
we are then convinced that God is still exercising his 
predisposing providence, and will continue to do so, 
even till the end. All the fulfilment of past prophecy 
is thus made to connect inseparably with other things 
which are predicted with equal clearness, but which are 
not yet fulfilled. Thus we see, that for four thousand 
years, the principal events of the world, being connected 
with the purposes of God's remedial dispensation for 
man, had been successively disclosed by a prophetical 
revelation in each instance, a long time previous to the 
fulfilment; and yet, the fulfilment was at length accom- 
plished in such a manner as to show that God was im- 
mediately concerned in overruling the order of events 

* John 12: 16. 



PROPHECY. 120 

by which the predicted results were brought to pass. 
But all which has thus far been accomplished, joins on to 
predictions concerning things which are yet to be ful- 
filled ; and thus we have a visible demonstration that 
God's government is equally concerned in the future, as 
well as in the present and the past. 

4. We can now take one step farther in this examina- 
tion, and notice the principal events which God foretold, 
as having a connexion with his moral and remedial 
purposes concerning man. On opening the Bible, we 
find that the third chapter of Genesis begins the series 
of prophecy, by announcing the incarnation of Jesus 
Christ. Soon afterwards, the general deluge was pre- 
dicted, one hundred and twenty years before that judg- 
ment came. The division of the earth between the sons 
of Noah, and the dispersion of the nations through long 
future times, was announced when the deluge was over. 
The calling of Abraham and the ejection of the nations 
from Canaan, were foretold four hundred years before 
the predicted events were fulfilled. The history of Joseph 
and of Jacob's family was made known by prophecy, 
long before their residence in Egypt. Jacob himself was 
inspired tojbretell the respective destinations of the twelve 
patriarchs, and the order of things until the coming of 
the Messiah. To Moses was disclosed his agency in 
delivering the Israelites from Egypt, long before he led 
the people forth. The fate of Egypt, the future history 
of the descendants of Ishmael, the destruction of Nineveh 
and Babylon, the rise and revolution and downfall of 
the four great monarchies, the Babylonian, Persian, Gre- 
9 



130 PROPHECY. 

cian and Roman, were each, in their turn, described 
on the page of prophecy, many years, and in some cases 
many centuries, before the predicted issues came. 

But during all that dispensation of ancient prophecy, 
there were many minute particulars disclosed concerning 
the advent, life, miracles, death and resurrection of Jesus 
Christ. These predictions were mingled with the prac- 
tical doctrines and duties which the prophets taught to 
their own existing generations. "When w r e come down 
' to the age when prophets were more numerous, we find 
that the disclosures concerning the future dispensation 
of the Messiah had become much more frequent, minute 
and convincing. So that prophecy served important 
practical uses in the process of its disclosure, and long 
before its fulfilment, as is asserted by the writer of the 
epistle to the Hebrews : "they all died in faith, not hav- 
ing received the promises, but having seen them afar off, 
and were persuaded of them and embraced them, and 
confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the 
earth." 

Thus it was, that as one prophecy was fulfilled after 
another, in each successive age, they gathered up an 
accumulation of evidence, which had all the effect of 
separate and independent miracles, and yet obviated the 
necessity of actual miracles, in each successive genera- 
tion. Thus to every age, in its turn, there is evidence 
before the eyes of men, that what was announced in 
prorhecy, is verified in fact. This general view of the 
subject may be summed up, by a brief quotation from 
the introduction of Bishop Newton, in his Dissertation 



PBOPHECY. 131 

on the Prophecies. " This is one great excellence of the 
evidence drawn from prophecy for the truth of religion, 
that it is a growing evidence ; and the more prophecies 
are fulfilled, the more testimonies there are, and confirm- 
ations of the truth and certainty of divine revelation. 
And, in this respect, we have eminently the advantage 
over those who lived in the days of Moses and the pro- 
phets, of Christ and his apostles. They were happy, 
indeed, in hearing their discourses and seeing their mira- 
cles; and, doubtless, many righteous men have desired 
to see those things which they saw, and have not seen 
them, and to hear those things which they heard, and 
have not heard them ; but yet, I say, we have thisadvan- 
age over them, that several things which were then 
only foretold are now fulfilled, and what were to them 
only matters of faith, are become matters of fact and cer- 
tainty to us, upon whom the latter ages of the world are 
come. * * Miracles may be said to have been the great 
proofs of revelation to the first ages, who saw them per- 
formed ; prophecies may be said to be the great proofs 
of revelation to the last ages, who saw them fulfilled." 

In order to illustrate the manner in which the pre- 
diction is confirmed by the event, so as to attest the 
divine authority of the religion which is thus sanctioned 
by prophecy, we may select certain specimens which 
show at once the prerogative of God, and the way in 
which men recognised its operation. For example, the 
following passage, from the prophecy of Isaiah, marks 
the prerogative of God in foretelling events which are 
brought to pass under his predisposing providence: 



132 PROPHECY. 

"Remember the former things of old; for I am God, 
and there is none else ; I am God, and there is none 
like me ; declaring the end from the beginning, and 
from ancient times the things that are not yet done, 
saying, my counsel shall stand, and I will do all my 
pleasure." * Another example, from the prophecy of 
Jeremiah, presents an infallible test by which God ac- 
credits the mission of those who are employed to reveal 
his will : " When the word of the prophet shall come 
to pass, then shall the prophet be known that the Lord 
hath truly sent him." f 

These views of the subject of prophecy, give us very 
grand, yet very distinct and simple apprehensions, of the 
purposes which were served by prophecy under the ancient 
dispensation. The prophets were the practical teachers 
of the pure and holy religion which was established and 
successively expanded, beginning with the fall of man, 
and perfected at the coming of Christ. Accordingly, 
none of the prophecies are to be regarded merely as in 
detached parts, separated from and independent of each 
other. The history of God's people before the flood, 
and the genealogy of the Jews from their first calling 
and onward, was but the lineage of Christ announced 
beforehand; the sacrificial and ritual dispensation of 
worship, was a connected representation of the coming 
sacrifice, and the various offices of Christ : the methods 
employed in worship were emblems of a worship yet 
more spiritual, in future times, and of the still purer 

* Isaiah 46 : 9, 10. t Jeremiah 28 : 9. 



PROPHECY. 133 

services of the heavenly world ; and the whole dispensa- 
tion of prophecy, from first to last, all tended towards 
and ushered in, the actual coming of Christ, and the 
development of his eternal plans and purposes of re- 
deeming love. Prophecy was, therefore, the gospel which 
was preached to the people of God in ancient times. 

The indication of the actual coming of Christ, and 
the benefits of his mission, were sufficiently clear, for the 
human welfare and the salvation of men, under the dis- 
pensation of prophecy. 

It comported with the wisdom of God and with the 
welfare of men, to establish a system adapted to the 
manners of the people and to the peculiar necessities of 
each advancing stage in the progress of the world. A 
system of temporal rewards and of visible types, was as 
much as the capacities of the people could bear. And 
while ? at the same time, the expectations of the people 
were sufficiently raised, to derive the benefit of the effi- 
cacy of Christ's mediatorial w 7 ork, in advance, it was 
wise and well that there should not have been too 
distinct a disclosure of Christ's personal ministry and 
offices, so as to lead them to depreciate and reject the 
system of gradual development by which God was 
preparing the world for greater things to come. " The 
secret things which belong unto the Lord our God," 
would, if disclosed, be a great disadvantage to those 
who were not previously fitted to receive them. If every 
thing concerning Christ's personal history had been 
as distinctly set before the minds of God's ancient people, 
as we can now read it in the gospel narrative, the 



134 PROPHECY. 

people would probably have thrown off the yoke of 
discipline, and would have ceased to value the dispensa- 
tion of law, under which God was training them ; and, 
long before the appointed period for the fulness of times, 
there would have been a restless insubordination, and ef- 
forts would have been made, by way of collusion, to force 
the fulfilment of that order of things which was to show 
the sovereignty of God ; and thus the fulfilment of God's 
prophetic word would seem, to the world, to be but the 
work of man. The evidence of a presiding moral govern- 
ment would have been lost, if there had been wanting 
the proof that God had arranged and promised before- 
hand a system of truth which was to be left for Him 
alone, in his own time and way, to accomplish. 

But, at the same time, while the system of prophecy 
was fitted to keep up the allegiance of the people to the 
truth, so far as it was revealed, the particular predictions 
concerning the Messiah, were attended with such strik- 
ing marks of the Divine presence, that the people of 
God had all that their hearts needed to rest upon, to 
lead them to a saving faith. They were not losers by 
the delay of Christ's personal coming. They were par- 
doned and accepted, and eventually received into heaven, 
on the ground of their faith in him who was to come in 
the fulness of time ; and the ratification of the state into 
which they had thus entered, was one effect of the sacri- 
fice and officework of Christ, when He came to perfect 
all that had been promised in his name. 



PROPHECY. 135 

Sec. II. Instances of fulfilled prophecies. 
Having illustrated some preliminary views concerning 
the nature and design of prophecy, we may now proceed 
to show the proof for the fulfilment of prophecy. We 
may select certain instances from the general mass, 
which it would require volumes to illustrate, if we should 
take up every one in detail. Single specimens must 
therefore be taken as types for their respective classes. 

1. We begin with those prophecies concerning the 
Jews, which relate to their sufferings, dispersion, and 
the conquest and desolation of their land. We omit, in 
this enumeration, those several intermediate prophecies 
which were announced and fulfilled within a compara 
tively short period after their prediction, in order that 
we may view those striking but minute announcements 
which were made at the beginning of the Jewish history 
in Canaan, and which were consummated in their final 
desolation, some fourteen or fifteen hundred years after- 
wards. When Moses had brought the Jews to the borders 
of their land, and was about to be taken away from 
them, he minutely described the terrors of an invasion 
which took place fifteen hundred years from that date. 
His prediction did not correspond to the peculiarities 
of any of their preceding sufferings elsewhere predicted 
in other successive and intermediate prophecies. In the 
28th chapter of Deuteronomy, we have, among other 
minute specifications, the following declaration : " Th& 
Lord shall bring a nation against thee from far, from the 
end of the earth, as swift as the eagle flieth : a nation 
whose tongue thou shalt not understand : a nation of 



136 PROPHECY* 

fierce countenance, which shall not regard the person of 
the old, nor show favor to the young ; and he shall eat the 
fruit of thy cattle, and the fruit of thy land, until thou 
be destroyed. * * And he shall besiege thee in all 
they gates, until thy high and fenced walls come down, 
wherein thou trustedst, throughout thy land; and he 
shall besiege thee in all thy gates throughout all thy 
land which the Lord thy God hath given thee." In a 
few verses farther on, Moses thus describes, still more 
precisely, some of the sufferings of that closing scene, 
when the Jewish nation were to be broken up and scat- 
tered : " The tender and delicate woman among you, who 
would not adventure to set the sole of her foot upon the 
ground for delicateness and tenderness, her eye shall 
be evil towards the husband of her bosom, and toward 
her son and toward her daughter; * * for she shall 
eat them for want of all things, secretly, in the siege 
and straitness wherewith thine enemy shall distress thee 
in thy gates." " And the Lord shall scatter thee among 
all people, from the one end of the earth to the other; 
* * and among these nations thou shalt find no ease, 
neither shall the sole of thy foot have rest." Moreover 
it was thus announced to them, — " And thou shalt be- 
come an astonishment, a proverb and a byword among 
all nations whither the Lord shall lead thee." In the 
following chapter (29th of Deuteronomy) there is this 
vivid sketch of what was to be witnessed after the lapse 
of fifteen centuries : " The generation to come of your 
children, that shall rise up after you, and the stranger 
that shall come from a far land, shall say, when they see 



PROPHECY. 131 

the plagues of the land and the sicknesses which the 
Lord hath laid upon it, * * * even all nations shall 
say, wherefore hath the Lord done thus unto this land ? 
What meaneth the heat of this great anger?" 

Now, these several descriptions, with their many par- 
ticulars, were never fulfilled in any manner answering to 
the predictions, till the Jews experienced their dreadful 
sufferings at the hands of the Romans, in the breaking 
up of their nation, in the latter part of the first century 
of the Christian era. The Philistines, the Egyptians* 
the Assyrians and the Babylonians, in their successive 
wars against the Jews, fulfilled none of these leading 
specifications. They were to be afflicted by " a nation 
coming from the end of the earth" — which was verified 
by the Romans, whose distant capital was Italy, and 
whose dominions extended to the farthest limits of the 
then known world. Their conquerors were to be a 
"people of fierce countenance;" " swift as the eagle 
flieth" — and to this description, the Roman army, with 
their banners surmounted by eagles, perfectly answered, 
for they came, like the eagle, hasting to his prey, with 
the strength, swiftness and ferocity of that fierce monarch 
of the air. They spoke a strange tongue, totally different 
from any language previously known in Judea or its 
borders. The awful slaughters described by Josephus, 
who was an eye-witness to the woes of his countrymen, 
bring to view some of those minute particulars which 
had never been verified before nor since. When Moses 
describes the tender and delicate mother who should eat 
the beloved son of her bosom, in the distress and terror 



138 PROPHECY. 

of the siege of Jerusalem, that scene of horror was re- 
served until the day when Josephus was compelled to 
describe what he witnessed. He minutely describes the 
case of a noble lady of rank and wealth, who, under the 
direful pressure of famine, was discovered in hiding the 
remains of the dead body of her son, which she had 
boiled and on which she was subsisting. 

But to see the circumstantial fulfilment of those an- 
cient prophecies here referred to, we must read over the 
minute and careful history which then and since has 
faithfully portrayed the awful fate of the Jews. Some 
of these strongest confirmations have been unwittingly 
furnished by the hands of the very men who reviled 
Christianity and discredited ancient prophecy. We have 
the striking confirmation of Gibbon and Volney, who 
have left their personal testimony, which is but an echo 
to what Josephus described in the first century. "When 
Volney visited the holy land, he knew not that he was 
answering the description of Moses, who had said, " that 
the stranger should come from the far land and should 
say, wherefore hath the Lord done thus unto the land ?" 
But when that French traveller and sceptic saw the ruins 
of the land occupied by the ancient and once higly fa- 
vored people of God, he thus said and thus wrote — 
" Great God, from whence proceed such melancholy revo- 
lutions ! For what cause is the fortune of these countries 
so strikingly changed ? Why are so many cities destroy- 
ed ? Why is not that ancient population reproduced and 
perpetuated ? * * * I wandered over the country ; 
I traversed the provinces ; I enumerated the kingdoms 



PROPHECY. 139 

of Damascus and Idumea, of Jerusalem and Samaria. 
This Syria, said I to myself, now almost depopulated, 
then contained a hundred flourishing cities, and abounded 
with towns, villages and hamlets. What are become of 
so many productions of the hands of man ?"* 

But without attempting to describe those historical 
verifications of ancient prophecy — which would require 
volumes instead of a chapter, to unfold — we may notice 
the strange and unexpected fulfilment of the ancient 
prophecies in the subsequent history of the Jews. Their 
casehad furnished a standing miraculous testimony con- 
trary to all the natural laws which have governed the 
fortunes of nations. Moses had said that the "Lord should 
scatter this nation among the people from one end of 
the earth even unto the other."! And other prophets 
also successively arose, who repeated the announcements 
of Moses, and who also repeated what Moses had said, 
that though scattered for ages, they should not be de- 
stroyed from among the nations, but should wait in 
hope of their final restoration. God had said, by the 
mouth of Moses — " Yet for all that, when they be in the 
land of their enemies, I will notcast them away, neither 
will I abhor them to destroy them utterly, or to break 
my covenant with them ; for I am the Lord their God." J 
This prediction was repeated a long time after by Jere- 
miah : "For I will make a full end of all the nations 
whither I have driven thee ; but I will not make a full 

* Volney's Ruins, chap. 2, p. 8. f Deut. 28 t 64. 
tLev.26: 44. 



140 PROPHECY. 

end of thee, but correct thee in measure."* The same 
unexpected interruption to the natural course of a na- 
tion's history, was also repeated by Hosea : u For the 
children of Israel shall abide many days without a king, 
and without a prince, and without a sacrifice, and with- 
out an image, and without an ephod, and without a 
teraphim. Afterwards shall the children of Israel return 
and seek the Lord their God, and David, their king ; 
and shall fear the Lord and his goodness in the latter 
days."f 

During the eighteen centuries since the Jews became 
strangers and wanderers in every province and in every 
country, they have still retained the character so well 
described, by calling them "the tribes of the weary 
foot." They have been persecuted and oppressed in 
nearly every land ; they have always continued a by- 
word and an astonishment among the nations, mingling 
with all people and tongues, and yet for more than fifty 
generations having no nationality, no common country, 
no local institutions, by which other nations could alone 
have kept up their political continuity. They have, 
nevertheless, withstood the countless currents of oppo- 
sing influence which, in a short time, would have oblite- 
rated all hereditary institutions amongst any otherscat- 
ered and conquered people which has figured on the 
pages of history. To this day, the preservation and 
characteristic identity of this dispersed people stands 
forth as the wonder and exception, in the face of every 

* Jer. 46: 28. t Hosea 3 : 4, 5, 



PROPHECY. 141 

thing else to the contrary, in the history of the world, 
and in the fate of nations. 

Wonderful as is this extraordinary fulfilment of an 
ancient prophecy, in preserving a people scattered 
amongst the nations, without losing their nationality, 
and who, in their previous social and political existence, 
had been bound to the soil and bound to each other by 
the strongest local attachments, and by the sequestered 
pursuits of agriculture which had shut them off from 
contact with foreign nations, the wonder is still greater, 
when we discover that their habits are entirely the re- 
verse of all those hereditary usages which had so long 
kept them a united and peculiar people. Seldom indeed 
has a Jew been found, in modern times, addicted to the 
pursuits of agriculture — the employment by which their 
local continuance had been maintained for so many cen- 
turies in their own land — but now, while mingling in 
every changeful occupation of commerce, art, trade and 
travel, in which they would naturally be likely to melt 
away like the drops of countless rivulets in the undis- 
tinguishable waters of the ocean, they still continue in 
numbers equal to the population which Judea perhaps 
ever attained to, even in the palmy days of David and 
Solomon. 

The lowest estimate of the present population of the 
Jews is placed at between four and five millions ; but 
there are good data for fixing them at fully six millions. 

2. Standing over against the wonderful instance of 
the Jews, there is, byway of contrast, a still more ancient 
prophecy, fulfilled on conditions which no human fore- 



142 PROPHECY. 

sight or historical analogy would ever have suggested. 
The descendants of Ishmael were described by a pro- 
phecy standing as far back as in the 16th chapter of 
Genesis. The character of that people is thus personated 
in the father of their race : "He will be a wild man; 
his hand will be against every man, and every man's 
hand against him ; and he shall dwell in the presence 
of all his brethren." And yet it was at the same time 
predicted by Jehovah, " I will make him fruitful and 
multiply him exceedingly, and I will make him a great 
nation."* From that day to this, those Ishmaelites and 
the Arabians, who were their lineal descendants, under 
another name, have been at war with all the world — 
treacherously invading other countries, and themselves 
attacked in turn — spreading over a country some thir- 
teen hundred miles in length and twelve hundred in 
breadth — never assimilating with any of the contiguous 
nations, which by their power or their refinement, might 
have been expected either to conquer or soften them ; 
but, on the contrary, the ancient kings of Egypt, and 
Cyrus, with his millions of Persians, and Alexander, the 
conqueror of the world, and in later times, the resistless 
legions of the Romans, each in their turn attempted to 
subdue this strange people, but in turn were bafBed. 
Though powerful and polished as many of these con- 
tiguous or invading nations were, they were always de- 
stined to see the fulfilment of that word which had de- 
clared ,fro7D *ie beginning, that the Ishmaelites and the 

* Gen. 16 : 12. 



PROPHECY. 143 

Arabians after them, were always to continue to be a 
great nation, "dwelling in the presence of their breth- 
ren," maintaining the wild and independent character 
predicted of them, nearly three thousand and eight 
hundred years ago. 

3. Equally conspicuous was the prophetical doom 
which Godjin ancient times, pronounced upon the Egyp- 
tians — a prediction, which like the case of the Jews and 
Arabians, is now spread out in all its present literal ful- 
filment before the eyes of the world. That most power- 
ful nation, while under its native Egyptian rule, con- 
tained a countless population, and was the home of the 
arts, the seat of the most magnificent architecture the 
world has ever seen, and was the granary for the pro- 
duce and " commerce of all nations. But at the period 
when her magnificent power seemed destined to per- 
petuity, the voice of prophecy repeated, in successive 
sentences, this prediction of her fate : " It shall be the 
basest of kingdoms, neither shall it exalt itself any more 
above the nations." " I will make the land waste, and 
all that is therein, by the hand of strangers :" " there 
shall no more be a prince of the land of Egypt :" " and 
the sceptre of Egypt shall depart away :"* and so it 
came to pass. At the period marked out by prophecy, 
when there was never again to be an Egyptian prince, 
and the sceptre of the land should pass away, that long 
catalogue of ancient Egyptian kings — the longest suc- 
cession, indeed, the world had ever known — terminated 

* Ezekiel29: 15.— 30: 6, 12, 13.— Zech. 12: 11. 



144 PBOPHECY. 

for ever. Several different efforts to raise an Egyptian 
prince to the throne had been repeatedly made, from 
that time onward, but they all failed. From the time 
when Cyrus broke that ancient dynasty, down to the 
fruitless effort of Napoleon to reinstate the Egyptian 
power as a great nation, the ancient, the medieval and 
the modern world, have been the continued witnesses of 
the fulfilment of ancient prophecy, foretelling her doom, 
and writing her future history, 

4. We can but glance at the fulfilment of the pro- 
phetical history and downfall of Tyre. That great 
emporium of antiquity was called " the mart of nations." 
The prophet Ezekiel, in his own day, gave a minute 
description of the magnificence and resources of that 
city. " Situate at the entry of the sea, which art a 
merchant of the people for many isles," " thou wast 
replenished and made very glorious in the midst of the 
seas." But while possessing all those means of wealth 
which Ezekiel so minutely describes in his 27th chapter, 
he had ,at the same time, been commissioned to declare, 
in the name of the Lord : — " They shall destroy the 
walls of Tyre, and break down her towers ; I will also 
scrape her dust from her, and make her like the top of 
a rock ; it shall be a place for the spreading of nets in 
the midst of the sea; for I have spoken it, saith the 
Lord ; and it shall become a spoil to the nations."* 
Several modern travellers, such as Bruce, Shaw and 
Yolney, have described the remains of Tyre, in almost 

* Ezek. 26 : 4, 5. 



PROPHECY. 145 

the exact words of the ancient prophecy. They speak 
of the ruins of the sea-girt city, merely as " a rock 
whereon fishers dry their nets." Volney, whose testi- 
mony as a sceptic, is the more impressive, says, in his 
Travels,* that " the whole village of Tyre contains only 
fifty or sixty poor families, who live obscurely on the 
produce of their little ground, and a trifling fishery." 
And Maundrell says, "when you come to it, you find 
no similitude of that glory for which it was so renowned 
in ancient times, but a mere Babel of broken walls, pil- 
lars and vaults, there being not so much as one entire 
house left. Its present inhabitants subsist chiefly upon 
fishery, and seem to be preserved, by Divine Providence, 
as visible argument how God has fulfilled his word 
concerning Tyre, that it should be 'like a top of a 
rock, a place for fishers to dry their nets on.' " 

5. In a similar manner, we might go on and describe 
the prophetical prediction, and its historical fulfilment, 
concerning the ancient Nineveh, "that exceeding great 
city of three days' journey," and Babylon, " the glory 
of kingdoms, the beauty of the Chaldee's excellency." 
But these modern days in which we live, are just yield- 
ing up their confirmation of the truth of ancient prophe- 
cy. For nearly twenty-four hundred years, the city of 
Nineveh has been buried up from human sight. And 
for nearly sixteen hundred years, scarcely a human 
being has ventured to approach the ruins of ancient 
Babylon. So awful was the prophetical doom de- 

* Vol. 2, p. 212. 
10 



146 PROPHECY. 

nounced on Babylon, especially, that a universal preter- 
natural or superstitous instinct has kept even the fierce 
Bedouin Arab from pitching his tent near its ruins. 
God had declared, by Isaiah,* that it " shall be as when 
God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah. It shall never 
be inhabited, neither shall it be dwelt in, from genera- 
tion to generation ; neither shall the Arabian pitch his 
tent there ; neither shall the shepherds make their fold 
there. But wild beasts of the desert shall be there ; 
and their houses shall be full of doleful creatures ; and 
owls shall dwelt there, and satyrs shall dance there. 
And the wild beasts of the island shall cry in their 
desolate houses, and dragons in their pleasant places ; 
and her time is near to come, and her days shall not 
be prolonged." 

Moreover, the particulars concerning the overthrow 
of Babylon were so minutely described, that the Medes 
and Persians were severally mentioned, long beforehand, 
as her besiegers, f The river Euphrates, flowing through 
the midst of the city, was to be turned from its chan- 
nels. J " The two barred gates, and the gates of brass," 
were to be opened to Cyrus, the conqueror, who was 
announced by name, more than a century before he 
was born.§ The feast of Belshazzar's revelry was 
specifically predicted as the time when sudden destruc- 
tion should come upon the city.|| We are indebted to 
Xenophon and Herodotus, the fathers of Grecian histo- 

* Isai. 13 : 19-22. t Isai. 21 : 2. Jer. 51 : 11. 

t Isai. 44. Jer. 50,51. § Isai, 44, 45, HJer.51. 



PROPHECY. 14Y 

ry, for a minute account of the literal fulfilment of 
what the prophets had long before announced. And 
we are indebted to modern science and enterprise for 
the means of discovering the treasures of prophetical 
fulfilment, long since buried up in the ruins of those 
two great cities. Babylon has been discovered and 
penetrated, now some twenty years ago; and "within 
the last few years, the researches of Rawlinson and 
Layard are bringing to light the still greater wonders 
of Nineveh. All this has come to pass, after such a 
total obliteration of all former traces of their locality 
during the interval of many centuries, that the former 
magnificence of these two cities, if not their existence, 
would have seemed almost incredible. 

The minute prophetical predictions, by Daniel, con- 
cerning the four great monarchies, the Babylonian, 
Medo-Persian, Grecian and Roman, were related with 
so much precision, as to the order of time and place, 
and succession of events, that these ancient prophecies 
themselves furnish the clearest clue to regulate the 
order of subsequent historical chronology. And so 
striking was this coincidence seen, between prophecy 
and history, that Porphyry, an ingenious infidel of the 
third century, endeavored to make the exactness of the 
prophecy a proof that it was written after the events of 
the history. But, we have already seen, from the testi- 
mony of Josephus and the ancient Jewish Talmuds, 
who wrote centuries before Porphyry was born, that 
Daniel had been regarded as one of their greatest pro- 
phets, from the day in which his prophecies were 
uttered and his writings published. 



148 PROPHECY. 

In this brief and rapid summary of the instances 
and specimens of fulfilled prophecy, we have ranged 
over the course of God's providence, as seen in prophecy 
and history, from the beginning of man, down to the 
coming of Christ; ard have seen the confirmations of 
prophecy, now lying before us in the world. 

From the fulfilment of all the prophecies of the past, 
we await the complete fulfilment of those yet laid up 
for the future. The Mohammedan power was the sub- 
ject of prophecy ; we have seen its rise ; we also await 
its expected fall ; in the same manner the Papal apos- 
tacy is described in its rise and fall.* The future mil- 
lennium, the second coming of Christ, the general judg- 
ment, and the final reward and separation of the right- 
eous and the wicked — all these are distinct and often 
repeated topics of the New Testament prophecies. 
Thus, from what God has done, we see what he will do. 
He never failed in fulfilling anything he foretold in the 
future, when the appointed time came. He is now con- 
cerned and pledged for the fulfilling of all he ever 
promised. And all that He has revealed, and all that 
yet lies secret in his Divine mind , will be brought to 
pass in due time. 

Sec. III. Prophecies concerning Jesus Christ. 
As Jesus was the subject of many of the ancient 
prophecies, and his spirit is styled " the spirit of prophe- 
cy," it is proper to give our special attention to those 
predictions which were fulfilled in him. 

* Thess. 2 : 3-10. Rev. 19 : 20. 



PROPHECY. 149 

1. We begin, by noticing the proofs, that a general 
expectation of a coming Messiah, was extensively pre- 
vailing previously to Christ's advent. Instances of this 
expectation present themselves, at once, upon opening 
the gospels. A general belief had spread from the 
Jews, among many surrounding nations, that a great 
being, long expected, was to make his appearance at 
about the particular time of our Lord's advent. Hence, 
the gospel of Matthew states,* that " when Jesus was 
born in Bethlehem of Judea, in the days of Herod the 
king, behold then came wise men from the East to Jeru- 
salem, saying, where is He that is born King of the 
Jews ? for we have seen his star in the East, and are 
come to worship him." Before the actual advent of 
Christ, we find that there were many of the faithful, 
who had been studying the ancient prophecies, and who 
were watching closely u the signs of the times." Of 
such was Simeon, " a man just and devout, waiting for 
the consolation of Israel ;" and the venerable Anna, 
serving God in the temple, and " looking for redemp- 
tion in Jerusalem"! 

No sooner had John the Baptist heralded the advent 
of the Lord, by his awakening preaching, than it was 
already found, as Luke says,J that " the people were in 
expectation, and all men mused in their hearts, of John, 
whether he were the Christ or not." The priests and 
Levites at once repaired to John, to inquire who he was, 
whether the Christ, or the prophet who was to precede 

* Chap. 2. t Luke 2 : 25-38. X Luke 3 : 15. 



150 PROPHECY. 

him.* Accordingly, when the multitude saw some of 
the first of our Saviour's miracles, they owned his mes- 
siahship by saying,f " This is of a truth that prophet, 
that should come into the world." 

These instances from the gospel history, are confirmed 
by the unwilling testimony of some of the contempo- 
rary heathen historians and philosophers, as to the uni- 
versal prevalence of the belief in the advent of some 
great being, whose way had been prepared by long pre- 
ceding prophecies. An example, among others of the 
kind, is the following, which is quoted and translated 
from Tacitus, the Roman historian, who wrote his his- 
tory before the last of the books of the New Testament 
were written. These are his words : J " The belief had 
gained ground amongst most men, as being contained 
in the ancient books of the prophets, that it should 
come to pass in that time, upon the Eastern power 
becoming strong, that certain ones springing up in 
Judea, should come into possession of rule; which 
mysteries, indeed, had foretold Vespasian and Titus. 
But the mass of the Jewish people, after the manner 
of human ambition, having interpreted so great a desti- 
ny of the fates, in their own favor, would not alter 
their opinions from the hostile, into the true sense," — 
[of these predictions.] To show how the philosophic 
pagan historians of Rome perverted the current belief 
of ancient prophecy, for the exaltation of their own 
emperors and conquerors, we have the following instance 

* John 1 : 19-24. f John 6 : 14. t Hist. Book 5, Sec. 9. 



PROPHECY. 151 

from the historian Suetonius, which is here given, in a 
literal translation. In the history of the Roman Kings, 
Suetonius says,* on Vespasian : u That the ancient and 
steadfast opinion had gained ground throughout the 
whole East, that it was decreed in the fates, that persons 
rising up in Judea, at that time, should become pos- 
sessed of dominion. But what had thus been pre- 
dicted of the Roman emperor, as the event proved, the 
Jews having appropriated to themselves, rebelled against 
him." Thus the classical and acute Roman historians 
with their characteristic servility to royal power and 
patronage, took advantage of a belief made universal 
in their own day, by ancient prophecy, for deifying one 
or more of their emperors ; according to some, as we 
see in the above cited case of Suetonius, those ancient 
predictions were to be fulfilled in one person, namely, 
the Roman emperor ; according to others, as in the case 
of Tacitus, the fulfilment was to take place in the empe- 
ror Vespasian, and the conquering Titus. 

The Jewish historian, Josephus, who also lived and 
wrote in the times of the apostles, while himself reject- 
ing the true Messiah, yet acknowledged the universal ex- 
pectation among his countrymen, which was justified 
by the ancient prophecies, that an extraordinary person 
had been destined to appear in his own age. But 
after his country was conquered by the Romans, and 
himself a prisoner, he thus explains away, by a servile 
adulation to his conqueror, a fact which he would not 

* Chap. 6, Sec. 8. 



152 PROPHECY. 

consent to see acknowledged, as fulfilled in Jesus of 
Nazareth. He assigns the universal expectation of a 
deliverer as the cause of his people's rebellion, and he 
credits the prophecy, as pointing to Vespasian, rather 
than concede it to Christ, who was the subject of that 
prophecy. These are his words :* — ■-" That which 
chiefly excited the Jews to war, was an ambiguous pro- 
phecy, found in the sacred books, that, at that time, 
some one within their country should arise, who should 
obtain the empire of the world. For this they have 
received by tradition, that it was spoken of one of their 
nation, and many wise men were deceived with the in- 
terpretation. But, in truth, Vespasian's empire was 
designed in this prophecy, who was created emperor in 
Judea." 

Such is a sufficient summary of proof, to show that, 
at the advent of Christ, there had been prevailing a 
universal belief, founded on ancient prophecy, that a 
great being was destined to appear in behalf of the 
welfare of the Jews, especially, and whose dominion 
was to prevail over the whole world. Now, we know 
that the sacred books of the Old Testament had been 
universally received by the Jews, as unquestionably 
authentic and inspired, for a period extending over 
about fifteen hundred years — the first of those books 
having been written by Moses, and the last by Malachi. 
Moreover, the books written by Moses, contained the 
records of the previous history of the world, from the 
creation of man, down to his own time. 

Hist. 6th Book, 



PROPHECY. 153 

Those records contained a brief summary of what had 
either been written by others, before the days of Moses, 
or had been treasured up by traditions and monumen- 
tal memorials, and had been kept in uncorrupted integ- 
rity through the extreme length of the lifetime of the 
antediluvians, as well as that of their successors, until 
the days of Abraham. Hereditary tradition could 
have been as complete a safeguard for the trustworthi- 
ness of the ancient history, and the records of ancient 
prophecy, before the time of Moses, as the tests of criti- 
cism applied to authorship could be, after the art of 
writing became common, or even since the invention of 
printing in modern times. * 

Whatever deficiency, however, might possibly exist, 
for the transmission of historical and prophetical records, 
would doubtless be supplied by the supervising aid of 
inspiration, by which means Jehovah directed Moses to 
prepare the first books of that sacred series, which were 
thenceforward to testify of Jesus, and to prepare the 
world for his advent. 

2. Our next step in this examination, is to consider 
the views under which Jesus Christ was worshipped 
and looked for, under the system of ancient prophecy. 

We may notice the predictions concerning the time 

* It is not, indeed, intimated here, that the art of writing may 
not have existed, in a form of high perfection, from the begin- 
ning of the human race. It yet remains an open question, 
whether language itself was an original gift of divine origin, 
or whether it was the result of human genius and the develop, 
ment of human nature in the progress of society. 



154 PROPHECY. 

of Christ 8 advent. The particular line of his genealo- 
gy had been ordained to extend through a period of 
about four thousand years, and it was to be consummated 
in the person of Christ. The foundation on which 
that series of predictions commenced, was the promise 
made in behalf of man, recorded in the third chapter 
of Genesis, that " the seed of the woman should bruise 
the serpent's head." But as ages advanced, the announce- 
ment of prophecy became more and more distinct. 
There was, first, a peculiar blessing upon the family of 
Shem ;* then, from this stock came the special branch 
of the family of Abraham, and in him, and in his seed, 
was this special promise made—" In thee shall all the 
nations of the earth be blessed."f Later still, when 
the patriarch Jacob, became the head of the twelve 
patriarchs, and predicted the destiny of the tribes, he 
was directed to single out the special tribe of Judah, 
from which the Messiah was to spring ; and the regal 
government was to continue in that tribe, till his per- 
sonal advent. It was announced in these words \\ — 
" The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a law- 
giver from between his feet, until Shiloh come ; and 
unto him shall the gathering of the people be." 

Coming down to within seven hundred and fifty 
years of Christ's appearance, Isaiah was directed to 
foretell not only the tribe, but the particular family, in 
whose lineage the Messiah was to be born : — " And 
there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and 
a branch shall grow out of his roots ; and the 

* Gen, 9: 26. t Gen. 18 : 18. t Gen. 49 : 10 



PROPHECY. 155 

spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of 
wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and 
might, the spirit of knowledge and fear of the Lord."* 
Two hundred years after Isaiah, Daniel was directed 
to designate the precise space of time which should 
elapse before the personal coming of the Messiah. He 
prophesied about five hundred and fifty years before 
that event. Daniel used the style of the prophetic 
calendar, in which, when exactness was required, a day 
was designated as a year. By making out seventy 
prophetical weeks, or four hundred and ninety years, 
from a given date, the space of time dstermined, 
would be so narrow, that the particular crisis would 
be looked to, long beforehand, for the promised 
event. The fixed fact from which the date was to be 
reckoned onward, was the decree of Cyrus, for the re- 
building of the temple ; and it was thus specified by 
Daniel :f " Know, therefore, and understand, that from 
the going forth of the commandment to restore and 
build Jerusalem, unto Messiah the Prince, shall be 
seven weeks and three score and two weeks." This 
definite view, so clearly revealed beforehand, was the 
ground of the universal expectation, which, as we have 
already seen, had prevailed, and prepared the way for 
Christ, at the dawn of his coming. 

We may notice the predictions concerning the locality 
of Ckrisfs advent. About seven hundred and twenty 
years before the predicted event, the prophet Micah 

* Isaiah 11: 1,2. t Daniel 11 ; 24,25. 



156 PBOPHECY. 

was commissioned to foretell the place where, improba- 
ble as it would seem, the Messiah was to be born.* 
" But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be 
little among the thousands of Judah. yet, out of thee, 
shall he come forth unto me, that is to be the ruler in 
Israel ; whose goings forth have been from old, from 
everlasting." But, when the time came, there seemed 
to be every presumption against the likelihood of that 
ancient prophecy being fulfilled. The mother of Jesus 
had her home, with her husband, in the town of Naza- 
reth, in the distant province of Palestine, far from 
Bethlehem. But, Herod the Great, being crowned 
king of Judea, though a vassal of the Roman empire, 
was directed by the emperor Augustus, to make the 
usual Roman census, in order to determine the numbers 
and resources of the Jewish population. But, by the 
usage of the Jewish law, in such a case, the people 
could not be registered according to their existing resi- 
dence, but were to be classed and entered according to 
their tribe and family ; and, therefore, every house- 
holder was required to leave whatever place he then 
occupied, in order to repair, for registry, to the city or 
place where the founder of the house had originally 
belonged. Thus, without any forethought on the part 
of Joseph and Mary, and without any public attention 
to the fact, they proceeded to the city of Ephratah 
Bethlehem, and upon their arrival there, the birth of 
Jesus was fulfilled in that town, where, seven hundred 

* Micah 5 : 2. 



PROPHECY. 157 

and twenty years before, it was predicted to take place. 
So unexpected was the manner of this fulfilment, that 
it eluded both the collusion of men to bring it 
about, and the vigilance and hostility of enemies to 
prevent it. Moreover, the forerunner of Christ, who 
was to prepare his way, was prophetically announced 
to make his appearance at a point of time just pre 
ceding. Thus, John the Baptist was marked out four 
hundred and twenty years before his appearance, by 
the prophet Malachi.* " Behold, I will send my mes- 
senger, and he shall prepare the way before me ; and 
the Lord, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his 
temple ; even the messenger of the covenant whom ye 
delight in ; behold, he shall come, saith the Lord of 
hosts." 

We may now notice some of the personal circum- 
stances which were to be fulfilled in the Messiah, 
Here we can discover manifold evidence of the over- 
ruling hand of God. At the same time, we can see 
the reason why the enemies of the Messiah w T ere per- 
mitted to reject the counsel of God against themselves. 

The Messiah predicted by the prophet Zechariah, was 
to be a poor and lowly man. " Behold, daughter of 
Zion, thy king cometh unto thee, poor, riding upon an 
ass, and a colt, the foal of an ass."f Isaiah had said, 
" He shall be a man of sorrows and acquainted with 
grief, * * despised and rejected ofmen."J Not- 
withstanding the innumerable instances in which his 

■ 

* Malachi 3:1. t Zech. 9:9. % Isaiah 53. 



158 PROPHECY. 

sufferings had been specifically predicted, lie was, at the 
same time, set forth, on the page of prophecy, by all the 
terms which could describe his godhead and glory. By 
one prophet he was styled " Immanuel, God with us ;"* 
by another, " The Lord of David;"f by another, as one 
" whose goings forth were of old, from everlasting ;"J 
and again he was called, " Wonderful, Counsellor, the 
Mighty God, the everlasting Father, the Prince of 
Peace."§ 

These names and characteristics, so opposite and so 
impossible to be reconciled in any one man, were equally 
descriptive of the humanity and the divinity of our 
Lord, of his shame and sufferings, and of his glory and 
dominion. They were characteristics which were never 
expected by the Jews of our Lord's time, to be fulfilled 
in one and the same person. And it is admitted by all, 
that they were never fulfilled in any other person, be- 
fore or since the advent of our Lord. But still, so clearly 
and numerously were all these opposite characteristics 
predicted in the prophets, that the Jews, unable to evade 
them, and yet equally unable to reconcile them, adopted 
the opinion, which passed into a tradition amongst the 
Jewish people in subsequent times, that there were to be 
two Messiahs, in whom these opposing features would be 
successively verified. They imagined one Messiah, who, 
in attempting to deliver his people, should fall by his 
enemies ; and another Messiah, coming after, should raise 

* Isaiah 7: 14. tPs. 110: 1. 

t Micah 5 1 12. § Isaiah 9 : 6, 



PROPHECY. 159 

up the first to life, re-establish the temple and subdue 
all nations. 

3. We may now notice some predictions concerning 
Christ' } s sufferings, rejection and death. In these mani- 
fold particulars we have the history of Christ minutely 
written many centuries beforehand. Isaiah showed how 
he was to be despised and rejected of men, giving his 
back to the smiters, his face marred and dishonored, 
with his wounds and stripes and bruises on his body.* 
Zechariah had said what was to be the price of his be- 
trayal, and the use to which the thirty pieces of silver 
should be put.f Many of the prophets, in turn, spoke 
of " the wicked companions of his death ;" and " the 
spear piercing his side;"J the "gall" offered him at his 
crucifixion ;§ his dying with the wicked and yet finding 
his grave in the sepulchre of " a rich man ;"|| the taunt- 
ing expressions of the multitude ; the piercing of his 
hands and feets, the parting of his garments, and the 
casting lots for his woven vesture,^" his not being left 
under the power of the grave, his resurrection,** the 
setting up of his glorious and everlasting kingdom. ff 

It would require an enumeration of countless partic- 
ulars, to show the exact fulfilment of all the ancient 
prophecies in the actual history of Christ. These which 
are here exhibited are only specimens of various classes. 
And these prophecies are scattered up and down through 

* Isaiah 53. t Zech. 11 : 12, 13. tZech. 12:10. 

§ Ps. 79 : 31. || Isa. 53. f Ps. 22 : 16-18. 

** Psalm 16: 10,11. ft Isa. 53. 



160 PROPHECY. 

the successive books of the Old Testament from begin- 
ning to end. 

4. We may now observe how prophecy was taken up 
and applied by Christ to himself. This will furnish a 
short, easy and consummate method of showing how 
prophecy was fufilled in Christ, and how it attests a 
divine sanction to his religion. 

The miracles which Christ wrought, showed that he 
was endowed with divine authority to expound what 
God had previously declared and recorded in his word. 
The literal conformity of these particulars in his history, 
to the previously predicted characteristics of the Mes- 
siah as he was figured in prophecy, was confirmed by 
the displays of divinity which enabled him to set the 
seal of truth on all which he declared. 

Let us notice, then, how our Saviour expounded the 
prophecies in their application to himself. 

Long before his disciples had any reasons to appre- 
hend the mode of his death, he described it minutely, 
and then added — " Now, I tell you before it come, that 
when it come to pass, ye may believe that I am he."* 
He announced his resurrection at one time, by speaking, 
as John says, "of the temple of his body." When, 
therefore, he was risen from the dead, "his disciples re- 
membered that he had said this unto them ; and they 
believed the Scripture and the word which Jesus had 
said."f And as evidence that he had been plainly un- 
derstood by the people, it is said by Matthew: " The 

*John 13|: 19. t John 2: 18-22. 



PROPHECY. 161 

chief priests and pharisees carne together unto Pilate, 
saying, Sir, we remember that this deceiver said, while 
he was yet alive, after three days I will rise again ."* 
He described, beforehand, the effect of his ascension, in 
the power which should come down upon his disciples : 
" These signs," he said,f " shall follow them that believe ; 
In my name shall they cast out devils ; they shall speak 
with new tongues ; they shall take up serpents, and if 
they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them ; 
they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover." 
The miraculous gifts thus predicted, began to be fulfilled 
at the day of Pentecost, according to the account in 
Acts : " This is that which was spoken by the prophet 
Joel ; and it shall come to pass in the las t days (saith 
God) I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh."J 

In summing up this view of prophecy, combined 
with its actual fulfilment in history, there is forced upon 
us a conclusion which no honest mind can resist. The 
series of prophecies was written by a great variety of 
men, containing predictions which had stood recorded, 
in some instances, for four thousand years. Now, we 
have the actual personal history of Jesus Christ, con- 
firmed by marks of authenticity and credibility, of un- 
speakably greater force than can be brought to attest the 
genuine authorship of any other ancient works. How 
then can the fulfilment of the prophecy in the histories, 
be accounted for ? Aside from the impossibility of our 
Lord, with such a character as he was known to possess, 

* Matt 21: 62, 63. t Mark 16 : 17, 18. t ActsS : 16, 17, 
11 



162 PROPHECY. 

wishing to deceive the people, how, if acting merely on 
his own account, could he have brought about the ful- 
filment of those ancient prophecies in himself? He must 
have been able to control the innumerable acts of his 
enemies, if he was willing to produce treachery in the 
heart of Judas, and to dispose the priests to pay the 
predicted price of thirty pieces of silver for his betrayal. 
He must have planned all the circumstances of his own 
condemnation by Pilate, the unexpected substitution of 
a Roman crucifixion, unheard of before among the Jews, 
yet predicted by ancient prophecy ; he must have plan- 
ned the conduct of the soldiers in all the several acts 
of his own dreadful sufferings, and the manner they 
adopted for parcelling out his garments, and then the 
singular omission of refraining from breaking his limbs, 
as set forth in the ancient predictions ; all these, and 
many more such particulars, he must have had the power 
to guide his enemies to do, if he had been merely a 
human being, wishing to make out that he was the 
subject of what, it had been so clearly foretold, should 
be fulfilled in I he Messiah. Moreover, he specifically 
declared, before he died, all the minute events connected 
with the breaking up of the Jewish commonwealth, the 
awful series of disasters upon the people and their city, 
the dispersion of the Jews, and the rapid and miracu- 
lous diffusion of the gospel from that time onward 
through all the then . known world : and yet, when 
uttering this prediction of the prevalence of the gospel, 
it had hardly gained a footing among the handful of his 
personal disciples. 



PROPHECY. 163 

Now, to suppose sucli fulfilment, apart from the pre- 
disposing power and agency of God, is what the human 
mind cannot admit as possible. As to human contri- 
vance and deception, there is no room for such a thought. 
To say nothing of the blasphemy of such a sentiment, 
reason intuitively rejects the idea of human contrivance, 
in view of the facts. The history of the fulfilment was 
as actual, as the preceding prophecy was authentic and 
specific. No argument can overthrow the evidence of 
the Divine Authority which is thus attested, by prophecy 
and miracle and history combined. "We have here, 
palpable and visible demonstrations that the hand of 
God has presided over the publication of the Christian 
religion. The argument from prophecy is the most 
extended and the most impressive exhibition of the part 
which God had enacted in the government of the world, 
and for the welfare of his creatures. 

The disbelief of these stupendous truths can admit of 
no apology. The evidence is more than sufficient to 
convince any right-minded man. There is no evading 
these proofs ,except by a moral perversity, both of mind 
and heart, which, if exercised against anything like the 
same amount of evidence for a fact of science, or a matter 
of human testimony, would convict the unbeliever of 
insanity. What insanity does, in rejecting the most 
convincing evidence among men, depravity does, in re 
jecting the testimony of God. 



CHAPTER ¥11. 

PROPAGATION OF CHRISTIANITY. 

In the preceding chapters, we have traced several 
distinct and independent methods of proof, all con- 
ducting us to the same conclusion in favor of the divine 
authority and inspiration of the religion of the Bible. 
The proofs which we have adduced, for the authenti- 
city and credibility of the Holy Scriptures alone, as 
those books have come down to our hands, would be quite 
sufficient to satisfy any reasonable person that the truth in 
those books possesses a claim to our belief and obedi- 
ence, which we are bound to yield, even if the evidence 
for such a claim were nothing more than those critical 
and historical tests, which have been adduced to estab- 
lish the genuineness of those books. 

But, in addition to all these ample sources of evi- 
dence, we subsequently saw how the proof of Miracles 
became a peculiar and independent method of establish- 
ing the divine authority of Christianity. We after- 
wards started from another point of view, and by an addi- 
tional and separate method of proof, discovered how 
peculiarly the Christian religion is attested by the evi- 
dence of Prophecy. These two sources of proof bear 
the impress of the special and extraordinary interven- 
tion of the Almighty, 



PROPAGATION OF CHRISTIANITY. 165 

But there are other and additional departments of 
testimony, kindred to these last mentioned sources of 
argument, but which, at the same time, come within 
the laws of human evidence, and which find their re- 
sponse in the unalterable decisions of human reason. 
One of the most prominent of these, is the extraordi- 
nary manner by which Christianity became established 
and propagated in the particular age when the gospel 
was first published. That unexampled prevalence of 
the Christian religion, is a fact to be accounted for. So 
peculiar and unprecedented were the facts connected with 
its early, rapid and general prevalence, that no adequate 
natural causes can explain those facts apart from the 
admission of a special Divine Providence, thus authen- 
ticating the gospel. If Christianity could have gained 
its acknowledged universal currency, simply by the 
aid of certain known human means, there would not 
necessarily be any propriety in ascribing it to any 
miraculous or providential interposition. 

Several remarkable impostures have gained rapid 
and extensive prevalence, in various ages of the world ; 
but, in every one of such cases, we have the best evi- 
dence of the operation of agencies, which are entirely 
adequate to account for their currency, without sup- 
posing any preternatural interference. The ignorance, 
the vices, the ambition and interest of men, together 
with certain remarkable coincidences of events, are suf- 
ficient to account for every imposture which has ever 
gained a footing in the world. But in the case of the 
early and universal prevalence of Christianity, there 



166 PROPAGATION OP CHRISTIANITY. 

are facts to be accounted for, which cannot be referred 
to any merely human or natural agency, as the suffi- 
cient moving cause. It requires the admission of divine 
interposition to account for results, contrary to what 
could have been brought about by any agencies, simply 
human or natural. 

At the same time, the conduct of the apostles and 
the first promulgators of Christianity, can be explained 
in no other way than by allowing that they were per 
fectly and entirely under the belief of the truth of 
that religion which they were concerned in propaga- 
ting, and at a period of time when they had all those 
wonderful facts before their eyes, on which their belief 
was based. An examination of the state of the facts, 
will bring us to the conclusion, that there was a positive 
interposition, and extraordinary divine attestation put 
upon Christianity, by the manner in which it was origi- 
nally established and propagated. 

Section I. Adequate causes assignable for the gradual 
establishment of Revelation previously to Christianity. 

In order to apprehend the force of the argument 
under consideration, we must distinguish between the 
methods by which God revealed his truth, from the 
earliest periods after the beginning of the human race, 
on the one hand ; and on the other, the methods by 
which Christianity was first established and providentially 
preserved, from the first ages of its publication, till the 
present time. There is every evidence of divine inter- 
ference in the Old Testament dispensation, in all its 



PROPAGATION OF CHRISTIANITY. 167 

successive periods ; and there is also evidence of a 
special divine supervision in protecting and extending 
Christianity, ever since the first and second centuries of 
its history. But the first establishment and propaga- 
tion of Christianity forms a case by itself. Its imme- 
diate and general prevalence at the time of its intro- 
duction, is perfectly inexplicable on the ground of any 
natural causes, adequate for the unexampled results 
which were then brought about. 

We readily understand the causes and the methods 
for the slow and gradual introduction of revealed truth, 
as its several portions were successfully imparted, during 
the four thousand years preceding the advent of Christ. 
It was the will of God, that the state of the world 
should become gradually prepared for the full intro- 
duction and prevalence of Christianity. We may not 
fully understand why He was pleased thus to establish 
such a constitution and course of Providence ; but this 
we refer to the hidden counsels of His own infinite 
mind. But seeing that He has thus determined, we 
can also see the wisdom and fitness of the methods of 
his actual procedure. 

In the first two thousand years of the history of 
man, the truth which God had originally revealed to 
the human family in a state of primeval innocence, was 
handed down, from generation to generation, by means 
of such traditions as would ensure a safe and adequate 
transmission of whatever facts and doctrines had been 
originally made known to man. Owing to the extreme 
longevity of the ancients, when the atmosphere, tern- 



168 PROPAGATION OF CHRISTIANITY. 

perature, and all the physical conditions of the earth, 
favored the continuance of every kind of animal and 
organic life, through periods ten or fifteen times longer 
than have since been known, there was the transmission 
of what was revealed to Adam, by the intervention of 
only two links, all the way down to Abraham. We 
find that Abraham's lifetime covered over seventy -five 
of the last years in the life of Shem. Shem had 
previously lived ninety-eight years in the latter part of 
Methuselah's life ; and Methuselah was, for two hun- 
dred and forty- three years, contemporaneous with Adam, 
in the latter part of his life. Thus, for a period of over 
twenty-one hundred years, there was a regular joining 
on of hands, and only two intermediate links connect- 
ing all the knowledge which Adam had, with what 
was made known to Abraham at the time of his call- 
ing, in full age. Through all those periods, there was 
an amount of divine revelation suitable to the existing 
state of the world. But if, at those periods, God had 
made all of that complete revelation, which He even 
intended to make, and had restricted and conformed it 
to the condition of the world, as it then was, it would 
not have been suited to those later states of the world, 
and of the race of men, which were to grow out of the 
progress of his providence in after times. A revela- 
tion for the antediluvian world, would not have met the 
condition of the world twenty-five hundred years later- 
And so again, if a full and final revelation had been 
made at any time before the age of Moses, the rude 
and scattered condition of the nations would have left 



^ 



PROPAGATION OF CHRISTIANITY. 169 

them unfitted to receive and communicate the evidence 
by which a universal religion could be alone attested. 
It would have been made in an obscure quarter, and all 
the rest of the world have been shut off from its knowl- 
edge, by want of the means of communication after- 
wards existing. 

So also, during all of the early centuries of the Jew- 
ish nation, while they were so slowly recovering from 
their previous bondage in Egypt, and throwing off the 
effects contracted from the surrounding paganism, that 
people could not have been prepared for a revelation, 
which was to be attested by evidence so clear, brilliant 
and universal, that it was to stand the test of examina- 
tion in all ages, among all nations, however distant, and 
in all the higher stages of civilization. Then again, 
after the age of the Hebrew prophets had fully come 
on, the political state of the world, during the succession 
of the Assyrian, Babylonian, Persian and Grecian em- 
pires, was so turbulent, unsettled and warlike, that a 
system of religion, designed for universal propagation 
by peaceful means, could not have been established by 
such evidence as would be fitted for appreciation by all 
coming nations and all future times. But, during all of 
those ancient periods, the truth which God was pleased 
to reveal, was made known in such measures as corres- 
ponded to the degree of progress by which He was 
advancing that portion of the human family which He 
had selected as the special depository of His revealed 
will. For reasons which God has thus made known, 
we can see why the truth, which He had revealed, 



170 PROPAGATION OP CHRISTIANITY. 

should have been restricted as to the local limits over 
which it extended, and the slow and gradual stages by 
which it prevailed. We are now prepared to weigh 
the evidence which demonstrates the divine authority 
of Christianity, from the unexampled manner of its 
propagation immediately upon its introduction into the 
world. 

Sec. II. Existing obstacles to the extension of Christi- 
anity were sufficient to destroy it, unless it had been 
supernaturally aided at its inti oduction. 
The Jewish religion, however pure it originally was, 
always remained restricted to one small nation. If 
proselytes were sometimes gained, under the Abrahamic 
covenant, the claims of that system continued to be 
none the less exclusive. It was never intended to be 
propagated beyond the local precincts of the Hebrew 
people. The same local limitations also marked every 
form of heathen religion then and previously known to 
the world. It was never an acknowledged principle 
before Christianity, to seek enlargement for a religion, 
by persuading and converting people of another faith. 
Every form of religion grew up from the circumstances 
of each people, as the natural product of their own 
previous condition. It was the received opinion among 
mankind that every nation must have its own religion, 
as well as its own language, and its principal usages. 
Every religion had become ingrained into the warp and 
woof of the political organization and history of each 
people, so that, to bring all nations under one religion, 



PROPAGATION 01" CHRISTIANITY. 1*71 

was thought to be as great an absurdity, as to bring 
them all into the use of one language, or under the 
operation of one form of government. It stands as the 
recorded sentiment of Celsus, the first adversary who 
wrote against Christianity, in the second century, that 
" a man must be very weak to imagine that Greeks and 
barbarians, in Asia, Europe and Lybia, can ever unite 
under the same system of religion." 

Such was the time, and such the circumstances, when 
Jesus Christ, having about finished his earthly ministry, 
left his truth to his disciples, and pointed out the des- 
truction of the Jewish state, as the period at which his 
gospel should have been published among all nations. 
That event took place about forty years after Christ's 
ascension ; and the words in which he announced it, 
were these : " And the gospel of the kingdom shall be 
preached in all the world, for a witness unto all nations: 
and then shall the end be." * The commission of the 
apostles was uttered by Christ in these words: "He 
said unto them, Go ye into all the world and preach 
the gospel to every creature." And the same evangelist 
gives the summary of its fulfilment, in what took place 
a few years after : " And they went forth and preached 
everywhere, the Lord working with them, and confirm- 
ing the word with signs following." f When these dis- 
ciples went forth to preach, the gospel in all the world, 
the whole world stood arrayed against them. They 
were men of humble life, without art, wealth or elo- 

* Matt. 24: 14. t Mark 16: 15-20. 



1*72 PROPAGATION OF CHRISTIANITY. 

quence, belonging chiefly to the Galileans, from the 
most obscure of the Jewish provinces. They were thus 
a degraded class among their own countrymen, opposed 
by all the polished classes, and the hereditary priest- 
hood and nobility. Thus all the means of natural 
power and religious prejudice were combined to crush 
them. Their own countrymen were universally com- 
mitted to the expectation and belief of some secular 
prince and mighty deliverer, who was soon to appear, 
to disenthral them from servitude to the Eoman power. 
The people were completely under the control of their 
priesthood. 

The same was true of every pagan nation, whether 
rude or polished. The priesthood of the Roman em- 
pire possessed the wealth and the high places of power, 
the control of public education, and the patronage of 
learning and the arts, which immemorial usage and 
superstitious veneration had gained to them from the 
homage of the people. And the power of political 
government, as well as of the priesthood, was equally 
pledged for the suppression of Christianity, when it 
asserted its claims as a new and universal religion. It 
was the official act of Pilate, as the Roman governor, 
which doomed the founder of Christianity to an igno- 
minious death. But in the face of such persecution, 
thus cruelly commenced and relentlessly carried on, the 
rising power and prevalence of Christianity gained 
rapid and universal sway. The Roman government, as 
it had the power, so also it had the disposition, to crush 
this religion, if it was possible to be extirpated. For 



PROPAGATION OF CHRISTIANITY. lY3 

while the Eoman power recognised the policy of pro- 
tecting every provincial religion in countries which it 
conquered, and gave a place in the Pantheon for the 
image of every god brought to Rome from every tribu- 
tary people, it had been known to the Roman govern- 
ment that this new religion of Christianity had, from 
the beginning, challenged for itself a universal acceptance, 
and proclaimed its uncompromising determination to 
displace every other form of religious faith. This design 
was never concealed. The Christians, who disowned all 
image worship and mystical rituals, were every where 
denounced by their contemporaries as atheists, because, 
in every temple and dwelling of the heathen, there 
were the gods which the nations worshipped, but which 
the Christians condemned. 

The hostility with which the existing governments 
persecuted the Christians, may be seen from the account 
which Tacitus, the standard Roman historian of that 
period, has left, concerning what took place in Rome 
during the time when the apostles were employed in 
fulfilling the commission to convey the gospel to every 
nation. Tacitus wrote while the apostles were writing, 
and thus records their doings in his own day. He says, 
in order to place the Christians under still greater odium 
at Rome, the Emperor Nero having fired the city, laid 
the blame of it upon the Christians. Then began a 
series of unparalleled punishments. Tacitus, after 
saying that the Christian religion, upon the death of 
Christ its founder, had first overspread all Judea and 
now found its way into Rome, describes those who were 



174 PROPAGATION OF CHRISTIANITY. 

thus apprehended and punished, as " a vast multitude."* 
He says that many of them were enveloped in the skins 
of wild beasts, and placed in the circus, to be beset by 
dogs and torn to pieces by savage animals. Some 
were crucified : some, wrapped up in shirts lined with 
pitch, were burned to illuminate the darkness of the 
night. Nero himself, sometimes disguised as a chari- 
oteer, would mingle on foot among the crowd, and 
feasted his eyes in watching the effect of these displays 
in the public circus. 

Without mentioning farther the minute particulars 
given by Tacitus, we may notice the testimony of the 
Governor Pliny to the Emperor Trajan, just after the 
life and labors of the Apostle John had closed. In his 
official message which has come down to us, he describes 
the methods which he had used to crush Christianity ; 
and upon finding the work growing on his hands, he 
asks the emperor for advice in his future conduct. He 
says that, after interrogating Christians and threatening 
them with capital punishment, he ordered those to be 
executed who persisted in holding their faith. Further 
on, he mentions the fact of his torturing some female 
deaconesses, in order to ascertain the truth, and says 
he could find nothing in them, except what he calls " a 
depraved and excessive superstition." He says, the 
number of culprits, as he terms them, was so great as 
to call for consultation with the emperor ; and speaks 
of persons of every age and both sexes, and more, com- 

* Ingena multitude 



PROPAGATION OF CHRISTIANITY, 1*75 

ing into the same situation ; and he adds, " that the 
contagion of the superstition hath spread not only- 
through the cities, but also the villages and the coun- 
try." And yet, in another part of his message, he 
speaks of these Christian societies being accustomed, on 
their stated days, to meet before daylight, to repeat, 
among themselves, hymns to Christ as their God, and 
binding themselves, by an oath, not to commit any wick- 
edness, not to violate their promise or pledge ; and after 
thus separating, they would again meet at their pro- 
miscuous and harmless meals. Such is a brief specimen 
of the unvarnished account which the Governor Pliny- 
felt obliged officially to communicate to the imperial 
government. 

It may be here stated, as a conclusive summary of 
that whole period of ten persecutions, beginning with 
the apostles, and ending with the Roman emperor, 
Constantine, that the edicts of the emperors, command- 
ing the governors of provinces to inflict death upon 
those persisting in their Christianity, were never repealed 
until the conversion of Constantine himself. Cyprian 
has left his melancholy recital of the persecutions which 
prevailed through all the provinces of Asia and Africa 
and Europe, in which Christianity had then prevailed. 
The quotations which Lardner has given from Cyprian, 
show that " in a short time the punishments of death 
were so common, that, as related by the writers of those 
times, no famine, pestilence or war, ever consumed more 
men at a time." These are the words of Cyprian : 
" Those who suffered for the cause of Christ, men, 



176 PROPAGATION OF CHRISTIANITY. 

women, youths of both sexes, were so numerous as to 
be estimated only in the mass. In torments, they stood 
stronger than their enemies ; their bruised and mangled 
limbs proving too hard for the instruments with which 
their flesh was raked and pulled from them ; the blows, 
however often repeated, could not conquer their im- 
pregnable faith ; even though, they not only sliced and 
tore off their flesh, but raked into their bowels." These 
terrible persecutions, so long continued, and so exten- 
sively carried on through several centuries, are sufficient 
evidence of the wonderful rapidity with which Christi- 
anity penetrated the nations during the lifetime of the 
apostles. 

Sec. III. Proofs of the rapid progress of Christianity 
during the first ages of its history. 
It has already been intimated with, sufficient distinct- 
ness, how rapid was the propagation of Christianity 
among the nations during the age of the apostles. But 
we may briefly refer to some of those comprehensive 
descriptions which narrate the early progress of the 
gospel. The book of Acts tells us of the three thousand 
converted on the day of Pentecost : of live thousand 
converted a few days afterwards : "a great company of 
the priests being obedient to the faith." Upon the break- 
ing out of the first persecution in Judea, it is said, " the 
disciples w T ent everywhere preaching the Word ;'' and 
in three years time, churches were planted throughout 
Judea, Samaria and Galilee."* In two or three years 

* Acts 9: 13. 



PROPAGATION OF CHRISTIASTCTT. Ill 

after, the gospel was carried to the Gentiles ; and in 
less than thirty years from that time, it is recorded, that 
the gospel had entered Greece, with its many contiguous 
islands, and had penetrated into the city of Rome ; and that 
all the principal cities and countries, lying around the 
northern and eastern regions, and on the borders of the 
Mediterranean, had received the gospel. 

The provinces of Asia Minor and the regions of Syria, 
extending northward and eastward to Damascus, and 
southward to the sea coast of Africa, had received the 
gospel in that short period during which the New Testa- 
ment writings were in the course of being published. 
Many of the contemporary classical writers of Rome 
have left notices, in that same age, or a few years later, 
of the propagation of this religion ; and though they did 
not accept it, they could not, as the faithful chroniclers 
of their times, leave those facts unrecorded. Besides 
Tacitus and Pliny, already noticed, there are gathered 
up, in our depositories of evidence, numerous quotations, 
to the same effect, from Suetonius, Martial, Juvenal, 
Marcus Aurelius, and others. 

Sec* IV. The rapid propagation of Christianity ', a 
standard for attesting its divine authority. 
With the admitted facts which have been adduced 
as specimens of the evidence concerning the rapid 
spread of the gospel at its first publication, we discover 
the direct relation and bearing of the facts as an attesta- 
tion for the authority of the Christian religion. It has 
already been noticed that our Lord prophecied these 
12 



178 PROPAGATION OF CHRISTIANITY. 

results as having to take place by the destruction of 
Jerusalem, some forty years after his death. 

There is the general consent on all hands even from 
every cfess of sceptics and infidels, that Jesus Christ was 
a wise and holy man. whatever they may think of the 
religion of his followers. But with all the wisdom which 
every one concedes to Jesus, there is the clearest evi- 
dence that nothing but universal contempt and opposi- 
tion existed against the attempts of his obscure disciples 
to extend his religion, during its first years. Neverthe- 
less, it appears, that from the beginning, Jesus announ- 
ced the perfect success and establishment of Christianity 
in the space of forty years, No reason can be assigned 
for proclaiming his certain knowledge of this result, 
which was perfectly fulfilled, except that he knew he 
was holding and using a divine prerogative. His reli- 
ance, therefore, appears to have been placed entirely 
upon the supernatural aid which should accompany the 
preaching of the gospel, and the divinity of that truth 
which his disciples were to proclaim. 

That the apostles were not actuated by any delusion 
or imposture, appears from the simplicity and holiness 
of their character, and the sincerity of their convictions, 
attested by sufferings and death. They had all the 
means of knowing about the miracles of Christ ; they 
had seen him many times after his resurrection from 
the dead ; they had received his personal instructions 
concerning what they were to publish and what they 
were to do. And yet, unfurnished with wealth, pro- 
tected by no earthly authority, unadorned by the arts 



PROPAGATION OF CHRISTIANITY. 179 

of eloquence, they began at once, in the metropolis of a 
great nation, to carry abroad a religion which could not 
prevail but by overturning every other established form 
of faith. The same high pretensions they everywhere 
asserted, through every province of the Roman empire, 
through the cities adorned by Grecian culture ; and soon 
the same truths were borne onward to the heart of the 
imperial city of Eome itself. The facts of Christ's per- 
sonal history, the accompanying miracles as their proof, 
and the stupendous doctrines of the gospel, were the 
themes and statements which they everywhere pro- 
claimed. "With all the literary criticism and philoso- 
phical research of that brightest period of Roman history, 
there were all the means at hand to know the truth of 
those things which the first Christian disciples asserted. 
It is in vain to imagine that the force of sympathy, or 
the effect of example, or the stimulus derived from per- 
secution, or speculations in the marvellous, or the love 
of notoriety, could have had any place in persuading 
men to embrace that new religion which prevailed so 
widely in thirty years, and which, in less than three 
hundred years, became co-extensive with the Roman 
empire, then embracing the most of the civilized world. 
Christianity gained its firm footing in the face of all the 
scepticism and keen criticism and incredulity which 
distinguished the Augustan age, and all this, combined 
with the prejudices of the great mass of the people, 
would challenge every claim of a religion of such extra- 
ordinary pretensions. And yet, in the very place where 
the leading events of the gospel transpired, there were 



180 PKOPAGAT20N OF CHRISTIANITY. 

not a few of the highest rank, talent and authority, who 
embraced the gospel in face of all the odds against 
them, and at the risk of all the odium and persecution 
which soon followed. We have, in the New Testament, 
mention of the early conversion of Sergius Paulus, of 
two Roman centurions, and some of the royal household 
of the Roman emperor. Among the Jews, there are re- 
peated instances of a chief ruler, of an eminent judge 
of the Sanhedrim, and a great company of the priests. 
The apostle Paul is an instance of one who, from being an 
enemy, turned his great powers to the belief and pro- 
pagation of the new religion. In periods shortly follow- 
ing, we have the recorded works of the greatest men of 
their age, who brought all their talent, learning and 
philosophy into obedience to the gospel. Of such were 
Justyn Martyr, Origen and Jerome. Some idea of the 
vast number of learned advocates, whom Christianity 
had won over, may be inferred from the fact, that 
Jerome's works have brought down to us the catalogue 
of one hundred and twenty Christian writers, whose 
publications for Christianity had been given to the world 
within two hundred and fifty years after the last of the 
apostles.^ 

* Paley 346. 



PROPAGATION OF CHRISTIANITY. 181 

Sec. V. All other religions can be adequately accounted 
for, by known human causes, and by known histori- 
cal/acts. 

As we are compelled to recognise the agency of spe- 
cial divine authority in the first establishment and pro- 
pagation of Christianity, and as no secondary causes can, 
of themselves, account for the result, so, on the other 
hand, there never has been any other religion which 
acquired a rapid or general prevalence, but what we can 
account for, by well known secondary causes, and by 
the operation of natural events. The most notable in- 
stance of the wide spread influence of a false religion is 
the case of Mohammedanism, whose origin began in the 
seventh century of the Christian era. But in its causes 
and characteristics, it stands at variance with Christ- 
ianity, in almost every point. Mohammed arose in a 
dark corner of the world, in a dark age, when the pall 
of ignorance had begun to settle down over surrounding 
nations. Christianity, so far as it had become united 
with the state, had greatly declined, and the true fol- 
lowers of Christ were mostly driven into obscurity. 
Distraction among the nations marked the dawn of 
Moh ammedanism . 

The advent of Christ was a time of universal peace. 
He proclaimed peace on earth and good will to men. 
"My kingdom," he said, "is not of this world ; if my 
kingdom were of this world, then would my servants 
fight."* But Mohammed arose as a military conqueror. 

* John 18: 36. 



182 PROPAGATION OF CHRISTIANITY. 

He disclaimed all pretensions to the attestation of mi- 
racles, and he bore no credentials of prophecies. His 
moral system was made up by borrowing some of the 
leading features of the Old Testament and some of the 
principal facts of Christianity. Mohammed began by 
gathering around him only the rich and the great. He 
acquired the means of wealth by marrying into a 
great estate. He spent his first three years in winning 
over thirteen followers, all of whom became promoted 
to the command of armies and the dignity of princes 
and viceroys. But for twelve years longer, Mohammed 
could gain no footing for his system beyond the city of 
Mecca. He sought to conciliate Jews, by engrafting 
Judaism, and Christians, by engrafting much of Christ- 
ianity, into his system. 

So long as Mohammed was restricted to the means 
of persuasion, his religion advanced no farther than his 
own city ; and if he had relied on the merits of his sys- 
tem, and the means of persuasion alone, his religion 
would have died with him. But, on the juncture of 
favoring circumstances, he lifted the standard of con- 
quest at the van of armies, drawn from a fierce and war- 
like people. He rallied around him the Arabians, the 
descendants of Ishmael, concerning whom ancient pro- 
phecy had predicted that their hands should be against 
all men. The rewards which he promised to his fol- 
lowers appealed to the strongest and fiercest passions of 
human nature. His sensual paradise in another world 
was endeared to his followers by the license which he 
gave to their depraved passions, indulged already by 



PROPAGATION OF CHRISTIANITY. 1§3 

the pillage and conquests of war. He raised on bis 
standard the declaration of perpetual war against every 
nation of a different faith. The success of Mohammed 
in founding his system, can be accounted for by the same 
military genius and the chances of war which well nigh 
made Napoleon Bonaparte the conqueror of Europe ; 
while Mohammed had the singular co-operation of re- 
ligious fanaticism which bound his adherents to him as 
a divine prophet. Imposture marks every feature of 
the system which he devised to his followers, and the 
prevalence of that system was effected by the desolations 
of war over prostrate and distracted nations. 

The mere fact of the rapid growth of any system, is 
no necessary evidence of its merits, whether good or 
bad. A notable instance of a wide spreading imposture 
is now going on, in the western territory of this Ameri- 
can republic. The rise of Mormonism is the w T onder of 
the age. But so recent is its origin, that the persons 
are now living who, by their solemn deposition before 
the tribunals of law, have traced up to their source, and 
exposed, the atrocious impostures by which Mormonism 
has become established. The authors of the book of 
Mormon are all known. They have been proved, before 
responsible law courts, to be men guilty of every degree 
of lying, hypocrisy and sensuality. Those respectable 
persons who have had the best means of knowing these 
impostors, have testified that they are unworthy to be 
believed even when put upon their oath. When they 
gained a footing in the western country, they armed 
their so called samts with rifles ; and w 7 hen punished for 
some of their excesses, they succeeded in raising an 



184 PROPAGATION OF CHRISTIANITY. 

excitement in their favor, "by the stimulus and sympathy 
of persecution. They frightened their own disaffected ad- 
herents into servile compliance, by making examples of 
some whom they suspected of proving dangerous by 
turning against them. Secret assassination fortified 
them against those who would have been seceders and 
revealers of their own impostures. The unparalleled 
extortion of these people in wresting the property of 
their dupes, and building up a great monopoly of power 
for the sensual and ambitious pleasure of their hierarchy, 
almost exceeds belief.'* 

The recent testimony of officers of the United States 
government, shows that the Mormon territory is gather- 
ing its principal adherents and leaders from among 
horse-thieves, house- breakers, robbers and villains, who 
have ga hered there to cloak their deeds in mystery, 

* The facts, concerning the secret murder of several of the 
Mormon adnerents, who were suspected of disaffection, and the 
enormous fraud and sensuality of these people, are authentically 
attested by several responsible works, lately published, some of 
them at the instance of the United States authorities. A summary 
of this evidence is collected in the Westminster Review, for Janu- 
ary, 1853. And while this leading English Review spreads out 
the tnoimities of Mormonism, it apologizes for this atrocious 
impostuie, by a caricature and blasphemy against Christianity, 
conij ared with which, the infidelity of Gibbon and Voltaire, is 
but retired scepticism. The covert infidelity which is gaining 
ground amongst that class of readers whom the Westminster 
Review represents, is unspeakably more dangerous to the wel- 
fare of society, than all the monstrous excesses of Mormonism — 
a delusion which will soon break down by the weight of its 
crimes, or by the strong arm of just and righteous laws. 



PROPAGATION OF CHRISTIANITY. 185 

and to escape the deserts of justice. Besides these, the 
idle, the credulous and the vicious are swarming there 
together from all nations. The polygamy of Moham- 
medanism makes the paradise of their leaders, and the 
present governor of the Mormon territory is proved, by 
high official authority, to have more than a score of wives. 
The stream of population, flowing towards the territories 
of the Pacific, from all nations, has afforded the wonder- 
ful increase of those materials, which are now making 
this fanatical sect of Mormons the most rapidly growing 
fraternity of religious imposters, since the days of Mo- 
hammed. The vices of human nature, which are here 
so amply indulged, and the strange and rapid events in 
the history and extension of our territory on the Pacific, 
will account for the growth of Mor monism, just as mili- 
tary success and the eventful changes in the days of 
Mohammed, established and propagated his system of 
imposture. 

When Christianity made its entrance into the world, 
it stood forth with the olive branch of peace, and at a time 
when war was hushed, and the highest civilization of 
antiquity stood ready to scrutinize its claims. But while 
it aimed to establish society upon the enduring basis of 
God's laws, and to shed its light upon another world, 
the power of government and the passions of the people 
united and strove to destroy that religion, which thus 
came to save individuals and nations from perishing. 
Yet those nations which arose to destroy the gospel, at 
length tottered and fell. The people of many countries 
persecuted the suffering Christians ; but the blood of 
the martyrs became the seed of the church. In the days 



186 PROPAGATION OF CHRISTIANITY, 

of its purity and power, the friends of the gospel wielded 
no carnal weapons ; and their faith soon became stronger 
than armies. The religion of the gospel, in those days, 
when all the facts on which is was based were yet fresh 
before the eyes of the world, was set down by the hand 
of God in the midst of nations and in the hearts of 
myriads of men.* 

The extraordinary miraculous agency, which planted 
Christianity in the bosom of the nations, was the putting 
forth of the hand of God, which marked off the boundary 
between the ages of antiquity and a new era of human 
history, and set up a point and period of departure for 
the onward progress of the human race. This external 
landmark is but the sign of that hidden power which 
still resides in the truth of the gospel, when applied by 
the quickening spirit of God. When the spirit of primi- 
tive Christianity shall again possess the hearts of its 
professors in any adequate degree, the gospel, with all 
its inherent and potent energies, will have free course 
and be glorified. Revivals of religion will again meet 
revivals, as one circle touches on another, and the 
boundaries are to extend till the kingdom of Christ will 
embrace all the kingdoms of this world. The heathen 
are to be given to Christ for his inheritance, and the 
uttermost parts of the earth for his possession. The 
supernatural Providence which guided the planting 
and prevalence of Christianity, is still pledged to give 
efficacy to all the means which God has authorized for 
the extension of the gospel. 

* Acts 21 : 20. IXoerac fxvpiades. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

BENEFICENCE OF CHRISTIANITY. 

The advent of Jesus Christ formed the boundary line 
between the darkness of all preceding ages, and that 
new light which thenceforward brightened up the pros- 
pects of our race. It was well said, by the gifted 
Madame de Stael, that "the whole history of the world 
resolved itself naturally into two great eras — that before 
Christ's coming, and that which followed his advent." 
When we stand on that dividing line, we look backward 
through a vista of four thousand years, and see melancho- 
ly evidence that, for the great purposes of man's nature 
and destiny, his moral vision was as obscure for dis- 
cerning, as his actual condition was wretched and help- 
less for using, the means of his regeneration and ameli- 
oration. Amongst the mass of nations preceding that 
period, the means which might have been employed for 
the elevation, only terminated in the undoing and degra- 
dation of man. But after that era, the history of 
Christianity became identified with all the remedial 
means which have elevated the human race. In show- 
ing, therefore, that Jesus Christ became the all-governing 
fact in changing the moral destination of mankind, we 



188 BENEFICENCE OF CHRISTIANITY. 

adduce a separate and independent attestation to the 
authority and divinity of the Christian religion. 

Section I. Causes of failure in all other religions 
previously to Christianity. 
If we look at the teachings of natural religion, that 
is, of unaided reason, assisted only by the natural con- 
science, we shall find them to have been utterly unfitted 
to restrain the passions or elevate the character of men. 
The few glimpses of light that occasionally dawned 
upon the minds of men, only served to render more 
dense and visible the surrounding darkness. The exist- 
ing systems of religion, instead of directing men towards 
realizing their true destiny, became the tyranny which 
bound them in ignorance. Man is naturally a religious 
being. By the constitution and activity of his nature, 
he is inclined and even compelled to worship some reli- 
gious object. But when the religious energy, inherent 
in his constitution, is misapplied, a wrong direction 
involves the soul in the darkness of ignorance and the 
tyranny of superstition. And such was always the 
practical result among every people who were out of the 
reach of divine revelation. Their superstition and 
mental and moral bondage, were the effects of that 
felt necessity, which prompts all human beings to look 
for an object of worship before whose power they might 
bow. But the true nature of man, as a moral and an 
immortal being — the true nature of God, as the object 
of religious worship — the true nature of religion, as the 
revealed will of God, for directing human conduct — have 



BEKETCCESCJE OF CHRISTIAKITr. 189 

none of them found their proper place in any religious 
system apart from revelation. 

The system of religion delivered to the Jewish nation, 
simply considered as an experiment of a dispensation 
of law, had also within it the causes of its own failure. 
But when we consider that system as containing the 
principles of the gospel in their germ — as shadowed 
forth, by ritual types and prophecies — we see all the 
evidence of its inspiration; and it proved all sufficient 
to direct the faith of the thoughtful Hebrew of old, to the 
future u mediator of a better covenant." Still, when we 
view ancient Judaism simply as a system of religion, 
imposed by law, sanctioned by the forms of primitive 
and retributive justice, we can discover in its history but 
a small measure of those ameliorating and remedial 
influences which grew out of that Christianity which 
was based on Judaism for its foundation. We may 
regard the legal dispensation of the Jewish system as 
an experiment, tried under the most favorable circum- 
stances, upon the social and moral destinies of the 
human race. But as an experiment, the efficacy of that 
system did not reach the wants of human nature. After 
a trial of twenty centuries, for elevating our race, for 
raising man to the proper elevation of his original moral 
destiny, or for securing the perpetuity of a people upon 
a lasting foundation, that system of law had lost its 
power and influence ; and the ancient and chosen people 
of God, at the Augustan age of the Roman empire, had 
fallen nearly as far behind in the world, as their heathen 
neighbors. 



190 BENEFICENCE OF CHRISTIANITY. 

During the long lapse of those preceding generations, 
the intellect and the heart of man, though struggling 
against the thraldom of surrounding darkness, had not 
yet received the regenerating principles of abetter faith. 
Literature and the arts supplied their influence for his 
recovery and exaltation ; but they all failed. Even the 
lights of science, so far as they were possessed by a few, 
were employed to enchain mankind as a race. The first 
principle of their philosophy was, that there must be 
one belief for the initiated and another for the crowd. 
So also the systems of morals and of politics, as well as 
of the existing religions, were constructed, not for the 
regeneration, but for the undoing of man. The divine 
rights of kings, as well as of the priesthoods, kept the 
race in moral as well as civil thraldom ; and priests and 
kings could revel in the darkness they had thrown over 
the souls of men. Under the influence of those systems, 
mankind, as a race, learned to adore the exhibition of 
vices in their divinities which they abhorred in them- 
selves. They fell victims to crimes made sacred by the 
sanctions of their religions. It was to their mythologies 
that they owed their ruin. The light of nature and the 
noblest aspirations of the soul lost their ascendency at 
the shrines of heathen divinities. 

As far back as we can look on the annals of time, we 
see the past everywhere strewed with the wrecks of 
fallen nations. Whether the dissolution of those nations 
proceeded from some fatality, unseen by human eye ; or 
whether, following the analogies of organic nature, they 
passed through the gradations of infancy, maturity and 



BENEFICENCE OF CHRISTIANITY. 191 

old age, only to sink away into the same common grave ; 
it is certain that there has always been some radical 
distemper in their constitution, which has wrought out 
their unfailing destruction. But what philosophers have 
been puzzled to account for, the history of Christianity 
solves. The nations and races, before the introduction 
of the gospel, have left behind them the lesson, that 
neither genius, wealth nor power, nor the influence of 
any systems of religion excogitated by reason, can secure 
a people against the approaches of its own dissolution. 

When patriots and philosophers groped after a solu- 
tion of what might shed light upon the prospects of 
man, their best efforts were only marked by failure. It 
was the revelation of Christianity which proved the har- 
binger of a more glorious day. The darkness which 
had buried the world in gloom, was dispelled like the 
morning vapors melting at the touch of the sun. A 
light then arose, which brightened and cheered the 
otherwise desolate wastes of time. Thenceforward 
Christ and his religion became the animating power, 
which produced and controlled all that subsequent civ- 
ilization, which has been identified with the name of 
Christianity. . 

The beginning of the Christian era was a new epoch 
in the history of man — a turning point in his social and 
moral destiny. From that epoch a light had arisen, 
which, though sometimes feeble and glimmering, was 
leading man onward towards the development of his 
moral nature. The conservative and remedial power of 
Christianity is to be traced from the first dawn of its 



192 BENEyiCEKCE OF CHRISTIANITY. 

appearance. Though its light was long smothered and 
concealed in its prison house at Rome, its living spirit 
could never be quenched, and after the long lapse of the 
dark ages, Christianity reappeared in much of the fresh- 
ness of its pristine beauty. But in all the progress of 
the world, since the dawn of Christianity, we can trace 
the great principles of that system animating and gov- 
erning the events of all subsequent history. In order 
to verify these statements, it is proper to point out some 
of those great changes which followed in the historical 
progress of Christianity. 

Sec. II. Positive blessings of Christianity in miti- 
gating the horrors of crime and the violence of human 
passions. 

The gospel begins at once by striking at the root of 
all vices in the heart of man. This appears in respect 
of those passions which lead to personal violence and 
public wars. " Avenge not yourselves, but rather give 
place unto wrath," was the teaching of one of the in- 
spired writers of the gospel. The source of all wars was 
thus pointed out by another apostle : " From whence 
came wars and fightings among you ? come they not 
hence, even of your lusts that war in your own members?" 
Now, what Christianity thus aimed to extinguish at its 
source, the most admired guides of mankind had always 
sought to aggravate and inflame. It is the testimony of 
the classical historian, Thucydides, in reporting the 
sentiment of one of the most noble Grecian characters 
of his time, that " to glut our souls with the eruelest 



BENEFICENCE GF CHRISTIANITY. 193 

vengeance upon our enemies, is perfectly lawful ; is an 
appetite implanted in us by nature, and is the most ex- 
quisite pleasure the human mind can taste." The tem- 
per of cruelty was fostered by the social usages, and the 
approved institutions of the most enlightened nations, 
previously to the publication of the gospel. Evidences 
of this, appear in all those classical works now in our 
hands, which we still use for models of taste in language 
and the arts of literature. We have but to open some 
of these authors, and we find them describing and en- 
dorsing prevailing vices from which any person, enlight- 
ened by Christianity, would shrink back in horror at the 
recital. Horace, and Juvenal, and Cicero, have frequent- 
ly recorded the approved usage of the Romans in dispos- 
ing of their old and worn-out slaves, by leaving them 
to perish on islands ; or, w 7 hat was not unusual, drown- 
ing them in their fish ponds to increase the luxury of 
their tables. Horace and other poets, in speaking of 
the chivalry of the Romans at their gladiatorial shows, 
describe the common feelings of young and tender 
women, who, when a combatant was vanquished on the 
arena, showed their delight, by directing the victorious 
gladiator, instead of sparing, to plunge his sword into 
the heart of his prostrate victim. 

The same classical authors descant upon the advan- 
tages of suicide. They mention, with complacency, those 
indecent and incestuous crimes for which our language 
can hardly furnish names. Unnatural crimes are mat- 
ters of constant record in these standard authors, of the 



13 



194 BENEFICENCE OF CHRISTIANITY. 

most refined nation of the ancient world. Poisoning 
and assassination were so much matters of course, that 
in one Roman province the praetor of the district, find- 
ing the evil becoming so great, had to inflict capital 
punishment upon upwards of three thousand persons in 
a single year, for the crime of poisoning. The crime of 
infanticide prevailed, from one ena of the Roman empire 
to the other. Amongst the polished Greeks, Solon, their 
lawgiver, provided by statute for the privilege of parents 
to destroy their children. Even Aristotle claimed the 
authority of government in favor of the same custom. 
So unquestionable and se universal was the practice of 
killing children, for the pleasure and convenience of those 
parents whom it suited, that a parallel to that awful 
state of crime, thus authorized by the existing religions 
of the Greeks and Romans, can be found alone in what 
has prevailed, till nearly the present time, among the 
modern Chinese. This great nation, in our own time, 
equally destitute with the ancient Romans of the gos- 
pel, are but the counterpart of the most civilized empire 
of antiquity, for suicide and infanticide. A large share 
of the female children in China, even yet, are destroyed 
as soon as they are born. In Pekin, the capital, about 
four thousand infants are murdered annually. Of 
course, where female children are thus so brutally des- 
troyed, all domestic virtues, depending upon the rela- 
tion of the sexes, are worse than inhuman ; they are 
little more than bestial. And hence, it was lately found 
that, when Christian missions had so greatly elevated 



BENEFICENCE OF CHRISTIANITY, 195 

the condition of women and children, amongst the Caf- 
fres and Hottentots, the natives learned to style the 
missionary, " the shield of women." 

Accordingly, it is but a natural picture which Sallust 
gives of his own times — the very years in which the 
apostles were employed in their labors — that u the 
Roman people were enslaved by luxury, avarice, pride ; 
wantoning in rapine and prodigality, trampling on 
modesty, friendship and continence ; confounding things 
divine and human, throwing off all manner of consider- 
ation and restraint ; men and women laying aside all 
regard to chastity." All this, it is to be remembered, 
was the legitimate product of the prevailing religion. 
Well might the Roman Seneca exclaim : " How great 
is now the madness of men ! They lisp the most 
abominable prayers in the ears of the gods. And if a 
man is found listening, they are silent. What a man 
ought not to hear, they do not blush to rehearse to 
God." It was the religion of the Greeks which crowded 
their temples with the images of sixty thousand gods, 
the personifications and patrons of every species of vice. 
It was the religion of the Romans which led them to 
deify their heroic murderers, and to adore the patrons of 
vices against which nature remonstrated in themselves. 
It was the religion of the wealthy Phenicians which 
made sacred to them the common usage of sacrificing 
their infants to Saturn. And the learned Egyptians, as 
if incapable of any lower degradation, bowed down in 
worship to leeks and onions, to birds and reptiles. 

While the awful condition of human society, before 



196 BENEFICENCE OF CHRISTIANITY. 

the publication of the gospel, can thus be endlessly 
illustrated by the testimony of those who themselves 
knew nothing of the gospel, the remedial change 
wrought out by Christianity can be equally substanti- 
ated, by the admissions of the leading infidel writers 
themselves. The modern infidels, of greatest ability, 
cannot fail to see and admit that a turn in the tide of 
the moral and social interests of men, began to take 
place when the gospel found its way into human society. 
Gibbon, in his work on the Decline and Fall of the Ro- 
man Empire, would impute the discredit and ruin of that 
great empire to agencies, in the share and odium of 
which he assigns a conspicuous place to Christians. 
His only apparent reason for such a blasphemous and 
gratuitous assumption, is, that the Christian religion did 
not preserve a government which had long before be- 
come rotten by its vices, and simply because it was too 
late for Christianity to penetrate and leaven a political 
system which had, in itself, the seeds of dissolution be- 
fore the gospel was published. 

Yet it is undeniable that the Eoman state was prolong- 
ed for several ages, and its ruin postponed, by that par- 
tial measure of public virtue which the Christian por- 
tion of its citizens imparted to the mass of society. It 
was the act of Constantine, the first Christian emperor, 
whatever may be thought of his personal Christianity, 
which put a final stop to the general crime of infanti- 
cide. He also legislated for the maintenance of children 
otherwise unprovided for, and provided, by act of law, 
for banishing the bloody spectacles of the gladiatorial 



BENEFICENCE OF CHRISTIANITY. 197 

shows, and also diminished the horrors of the previously 
prevailing system of Roman slavery. When Rome was 
finally conquered by the invading Goths, these rude 
northern hordes, having already become christianized 
sooner than the mass of the Roman people themselves, 
instead of venting the customary ferocity of all conquer- 
ing nations in previous times, restrained the passions 
excited by war, and saved from a merciless destruction, 
the fallen Romans. The first decree of the conquering 
Alaric was, that the defenceless people, who had fled to 
the churches or had repaired to the tombs of the mar- 
tyrs, should be saved. Thus, while Gibbon could see no 
virtue in Christianity for staying the downfall of the 
Roman empire, he is constrained to confess, in his own 
words, that " the pure and genuine influence of Christi- 
anity may be traced in its beneficial, though imperfect 
effects, on the barbarian proselytes of the north. On 
the fall of the Roman empire, it evidently mollified the 
ferocious temper of the conquerors." 

Sec. III. Power of Christianity in rectifying the 
natural affections. 

The life-like picture which the Apostle Paul gives, in 
the first chapter of his epistle to the Romans, concerning 
those very people amongst whom those Roman converts 
lived in the apostle's own day, shows how rotten human 
society must have become, from the festering overgrowth 
of the corrupt and unrestrained passions of human 
nature. But the spirit of the gospel, and the divine 
institutions of Christianity, at once established the rela- 



198 BENEFICENCE OF CHRISTIANITY. 

tions of human life and society upon foundations of 
God's own ordaining. The most palpable and imme- 
diate practical effect of Christianity as an institution, 
was in restoring woman to her true position, and in 
regulating all the relationships in which she sustained a 
part. This at once gave marriage the sanctions of a 
divine appointment. It abolished polygamy, and dis- 
owned the previously common usage of indiscriminate 
divorce. It was a profound observation of Bishop Wil- 
son, " that perhaps the superiority of Europe over Asia 
depends more on the abrogation of the practice of poly- 
gamy, and the recurrence to the original institution of 
marriage, than on any other cause." But this pre-emi- 
nence of European civilization, growing out of the 
divine ordinations which regulated marriage, and all the 
relationships depending on the sexes, was the work of 
the gospel alone ; and here its influence took immediate 
effect, at its first publication. 

All other nations, ancient and modern, give witness 
to the radical distempers which prevail through society. 
In the absence of the institutions of the gospel, Moham- 
medanism, Hindooism, Buddhism, and every form of 
religion but Christianity, have, from first to last, degrad- 
ed the female sex, excluding them from any equality of 
privileges with the stronger sex ; and it is a received 
dogma, in nearly every one of these systems, that 
a woman has no soul. When woman becomes thus 
degraded, all the grosser vices of heathenism are the 
legitimate and universal result. No place being found 
for conjugal endearment, there can be exhibited none 



BENEFICENCE OF CHRISTIANITY. 199 

of the proper attributes of the female character, and 
none of the elevating power of those affections which 
crown and grace the human character. Under such a 
system, the subordination of woman is nothing but 
bondage and drudgery. 

The same servile effect reaches the condition of child- 
ren. The mother, who is the natural guardian for edu- 
cating and moulding the earlier stages of the character 
of her children, being thrust from her place, the education 
and welfare of families must, of necessity, be sacrificed. 
Thus, under every system but Christianity, the habits pro- 
per to moral, social and immortal beings, are unsettled at 
their foundation. Every inducement for the progress of 
society and the perpetuity of the best human institutions, 
is sacrificed. Every form of education, except for pur- 
poses of ambition, or some other selfish and evil passion, 
is perverted or neglected. The primary relationships 
of nature cannot become adjusted for the support of 
equitable and benevolent institutions and laws. Morali- 
ty, in its best form, under such circumstances, must be 
founded on selfishness. The passions which keep men 
at variance with each other, are fostered ; the sentiments 
that would unite men and nations into a brotherhood of 
beneficence, are extinguished, or, if known, are entirely 
inoperative. 

The mental character of a people, however cultivated 
and enlivened for a time, can never long keep above the 
level of their moral and social condition. Until Christi- 
anity penetrated the hearts of its subjects, and found its 
way into the bosom of nations, there never could have 



200 BENEFICENCE OF CHRISTIANITY. 

been formed any firm basis for moral elevation, or social 
prosperity, or national perpetuity. The seeds of disso- 
lution among any people are always present, when the 
natural affections are wanting. Those affections co exist 
with, and form a part of, every true moral code. And 
the history of our race marked a universal distortion or 
suppression of the pure natural affections, till the era 
which ushered in the publication and prevalence of 
Christianity. The relations of the sexes were abnormal ; 
the subjection of children to parents and guardians was 
often based on no ideas of equity ; the power of mas- 
ters over servants was unrestrained ; and the ties of 
kindred and neighbors were precarious and unnatural. 
And with so much disturbance in all the primary rela- 
tions of life, there was a corresponding license of all the 
passions which unite men to the brutes. It was one of 
the most conspicuous charges which the first preachers 
of the gospel brought against the people of their own 
times, that they had not only changed the glory of the 
incorruptible God, but that the people were "without 
natural affections ;" that they, " being past feeling, had 
given themselves over unto lasciviousness, to work all 
uncleanness with greediness," and that they were " full 
of murder and malignity." 

Sec. IV. Provisions of Christianity for institutions of 
beneficence. 
The efficacy of Christianity depends less on the num- 
ber of its positive enactments, than upon its diffusive 
and all-assimilating spirit. The gospel begins at the 



BENEFICENCE OF CHRISTIANITY. 201 

centre and acts outwards towards the extremities. In- 
stead of lopping off the branches, it lays the axe at the 
root of the tree. It purifies the public sentiment and 
opinion by beginning at the heart. Hence, the gospel, 
as soon as it found a lodgement, began to act outwardly 
upon society. It was by this moral leaven, rather than 
by prohibitory enactments, that vices, which before were 
fostered by the most influential classes, were soon com- 
pelled to seek a covert in the darkest corners, or were 
banished altogether. Multitudes became thus restrained 
by a regenerated public opinion, even without feeling 
the gracious power of the gospel. 

Among the Greeks and Eomans, those men were held 
as examples of extraordinary virtue, whose personal char- 
acter was below the level of the common standard of 
the least improved Christians of our times. They were 
praised for having only that, which, if wanting among 
a Christian people, would be the stigma of their degra- 
dation. Those virtues, which claimed the highest hom- 
age among the ancients, and our modern heathen, would 
give no claim of merit to any common man, and were 
only what are now demanded of every one who would 
enjoy the sufferance and countenance of Christian society. 

A regenerated public sentiment, being once produced 
by Christianity, its natural outgrowth appeared in mani- 
fold provisions of beneficence. 

The ameliorating influence of Christian charity was 
seen at once, not only in elevating the position of woman, 
and adjusting all the relations of social life, but in pro- 
viding for human sufferings. The first disciples of our 



202 BENEFICENCE OF CHRISTIANITY, 

Lord, gathered up all their possessions for distribution 
among the needy and the persecuted. The first volun- 
tary and public charitable collection on record, was made 
by the churches of Macedonia, amongst the polished 
Greeks, in behalf of the poor Christians of Jerusalem, a 
people naturally subject to all the hereditary contempt 
of the philosophic Gentiles. It was a Christian, Dorcas, 
who made garments for the poor, and who was the first 
model and patron in founding asylums of charity. In 
ancien ttimes as now, amongst all others, except a Christ- 
ian people, public hospitals and asylums for charity were 
unknown. There is a rare instance mentioned by the 
Eoman Seneca, in one of his epistles, of what was called 
a Valetudinarium ; but it appears to have only been a 
house which it was for the interest of the owner to pro- 
vide for his sick slaves or wounded dependents. 

In all the records and remains of Greece and Rome, 
of Corinth and Constantinople, of Herculaneum and 
Pompeii, amidst the countless monuments of their liter- 
ature and arts, and the evidences of their immense 
wealth and genius, no trace can be found of there ever 
having been public provisions for the suffering and des- 
titute, at periods when those cities had not come under 
the sway of Christianity. The same melancholy blank 
is still found under the rule of Mohammedanism. 

In modern nominal Christian countries, where the gen- 
uine power of the gospel is comparatively small, the 
institutions of charity, though numerous aud extensive, 
are only the token and measure of the morals of the 
people. 



BENEFICENCE OF CHRISTIANITY. 203 

In Vienna, where nearly half of the children are born 
out of wedlock, foundling hospitals and Magdalen asy- 
lums receive the bounty of the public. In Paris, where 
the prevalence of licentiousness is comparatively unre- 
strained, there is the same ratio of charity expended 
upon the objects occasioned by the vices of the people. 
In Naples and Rome, the same law of cause and conse- 
quence prevails. 

On the other hand, just in proportion as we turn 
away from the countries which are darkened and de- 
moralized by superstition or by a corrupted form of Christ- 
ianity, we find less occasions for charity, and the objects 
of charity themselves are not created so much by the 
vices as by the misfortunes of men. 

Industry developes the resources of the people, aod 
removes the causes and the objects of suffering. And 
when charity is called for, it is not as a bounty upon 
vice, but as the means of amelioration. Less is exacted 
for government, and more is expended for the good of 
the universal people. When we look at the British 
empire and the United States of America, those two 
nations where the gospel is freely preached, and the 
Bible more generally diffused, and the true doctrine of 
Christianity better understood, than among any other 
people, we shall, at the same time, see the highest civili- 
zation, the purest morality, the most effective systems 
of well-directed beneficence now to be found in the 
world ; and more is being done for the amelioration of 
mankind and for the diffusion of the blessings of Christ- 



204 BENEFICENCE OF CHRISTIANITY. 

ianity, by those two countries, probably, than by all the 
nations of the world together. 

Sec V. Effects of Christianity on the characters of 
individual Christians. 
It is now too late an age in the world, to hold Christ- 
ianity responsible for the abuses which its enemies or 
false friends have perpetrated under the sanction of its 
sacred name. In the days of the first prevalence of the 
gospel, when Pliny was sent by the Roman governor to 
hunt down the Christians, the worst that Pliny could 
say of them was, that they u bound themselves by an 
oath not to commit any wickedness ; but, on the con- 
trary, to obstain from thefts, robberies and adulteries, 
and not to violate their promise or deny a pledge." 
That Christianity has often been counterfeited, it would 
be strange not to expect, even if there were no examples 
of it in history. For what could ever give currency to 
a counterfeit, if there were not known to exist the gen- 
uine money ? The ingenuity of inventions and imita- 
tions after the original, only attests the value and credit 
of the institution whose stamp is borrowed. Wars of 
persecution and conquest have been carried on in the 
name of Christ and the Church. But what infidels and 
nominal Christians have done, can weigh nothing, as a 
matter of argument, with those who look at Christian- 
ity in the sources of its authority, in its inspired records, 
its early converts, and those churches, societies and peo- 
ples, who have had the word of God scattered broad- 



BENEFICENCE OF CHRISTIANITY. 205 

cast among them, and who have built their religion on 
the open Bible. 

No vice has ever been known to be taught or encou- 
raged by a single precept of Christianity ; but oppositely, 
every virtue has its prominence, while there are also the 
accompanying influences to enforce its inculcation. But, 
on the other hand, let us take every class of modern in- 
fidels, even of the highest grade, who would displace 
Christianity by their own systems. View them, as well 
in their character as their conduct. What have Voltaire, 
and Hume, and Gibbon, and Bolingbroke, and Rousseau, 
and Paine, taught instead ? Has not every one of 
them, in turn, given his special advocacy to the vices 
that would destroy human society, and overthrow all 
law and government ? Did not Hume spend his strength 
in pleading for divorce, and adultery, and suicide, and 
duelling ? Did not Gibbon eulogize hypocrisy and spe- 
culate upon the luxuries of debauchery ? Was not 
Bolingbroke a professed libertine ? Did not Rousseau, in 
his " Confessions," say, in so many words, that he was 
a liar, a thief and a systematic debaucher, and glory in 
the recitals which he adorned with his genius I And did 
not Voltaire become the systematic corrupter of the 
virtue of families ? And did not the atrocious Paine, 
while eulogizing the age of reason, descend to a life of 
bestiality and corruption, from which the instincts of 
brutes would have shuddered ? 

The want of Christianity is seen in its effects upon 
the character, as well in death, as in life. And as these 
infidels have lived, so have they died, Hume, in order 



206 BENEFICENCE OF CHRISTIANITY. 

to keep up his credit for consistency, and to leave be- 
hind him an infidel's testimony, had to keep burning 
candles and constant attendants by his side, and di- 
verted himself by playing cards on his dying bed. Vol- 
taire declared, on his death bed, in remorse and terror, 
that he was forsaken of God and men ; he uttered his 
terrible belief that he was going to hell ; and reviled 
his infidel friends for bringing him to his miserable 
state. Eousseau, having abandoned the women and 
the children whom he had corrupted and then disowned, 
gave his own testimony, that as he had learned " to be 
guilty without remorse, so he would become, without 
measure." Paine, in his last moments, turned to his 
guilty associates and said, " You see what miserable 
comforters I have." And he died at last, in his parox- 
ysms of remorse, exclaiming, " Lord help me, Jesus 
Christ help me !" What these apostles of infidelity have 
witnessed to, in themselves, has been evinced, again and 
again, in their deluded votaries. 

But need we linger on such scenes ? "O my soul, 
come not thou into their secret ; unto their assembly, 
mine honor, be not thou united!" It is the gospel 
alone that can give comfort and peace in life, and con- 
solation and support in the hour of death. Multitudes 
have found that, having lived for Christ, death to them 
is their everlasting gain. The dying believer can say 
with Jacob, " I have waited for thy salvation, Lord," — 
and with Job, " I know that my Redeemer liveth," — 
and with Paul, "I am now ready to be offered, and 
the time of my departure is at hand, I have fought a 



BENEFICENCE OF CHRISTIANITY. 207 

good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the 
faith; henceforth there is laid tip for me a crown of 
righteousness which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall 
give me at that day." And well may we fervently 
utter the prayer, " Let me die the death of the right- 
eous, and let my last end be like his." 



CHAPTER IX. 

INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 

It is a capital article of the Christian system, that the 
sacred Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments are 
to be received as the record of truths, sanctioned by the 
authority and supernatural inspiration of the Almighty. 
It is not simply as an authenticated history of the high- 
est order, and as a most trustworthy narrative of facts, 
that this holy book is to be received as the sacred 
canon and directory for our faith and practice. It may, 
indeed, be safely said, in view of all the literary and his- 
torical evidence by which the Bible is attested, that it 
stands immeasurably above any other genuine book, 
which has come down to us from antiquity, in respect 
both of its authorship, and the trustworthiness of its 
narratives. But the authoritative claim which the Bible 
makes on our acceptance, does not rest merely upon its 
external evidences, however convincing they may be. 
Simply as a matter of evidence, there is all the testi- 
mony which such a case can admit of, that the things 
recorded in the Bible were facts which actually occur- 
red, or truths which unquestionably exist. As to the 
doctrines and revelations of the Bible, their authority is 



INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 209 

attested by the supernatural evidence of miracles and 
of fulfilled prophecy, and by the miraculous manner in 
which Christianity gained its early, rapid and general 
prevalence. There is, moreover, a self-evident and inde- 
pendent attestation of the divine authority of the Bible, 
when we consider the power of its truths to renovate the 
human character, and to ameliorate the condition of 
mankind, and the historical proofs that such extraordi- 
nary moral changes were effected immediately upon the 
introduction of Christianity into the world. 

The divine authority of the Scriptures is not based 
merely upon the proofs of their authenticity and credi- 
bility, nor simply upon the fact that we now possess the 
Scriptures in as unmutilated a form, as if they had been 
now first given by their authors. We have elsewhere 
shown, and it will be still more clearly proved, in a fol- 
lowing section, that the method of examining the au- 
thenticity aad credibility of the Scriptures, also carries 
with it a demonstration of the complete literal integrity 
of these sacred books; so that, under the circumstances, 
it would have been entirely impossible to have made 
any material alterations in the text of these books, so 
remarkably guarded as they were, both by the friends 
of the Bible, and which were also watched by heretics 
and foes in every age, who had access to these books as 
freely as they could wish. 

But all these enumerated proofs are not the principal 

grounds for that authority which we are called on to 

yield to the Scriptures in matters of religion. After the 

lapse of so many centuries since the introduction of 

14 



BIO INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTUKES. 

Christianity and the publication of the Bible, we require 
to know the grounds of that authority by which the 
Scriptures are to us the sources of infallible truth and 
doctrine. Our articles of faith and our rules of life are 
to be based upon the authority of that written volume 
which we call the Bible, or the Scriptures of the Old 
and New Testaments. 

Moreover, while the doctrines and truths of the Scrip- 
tures are admitted to be divine, there is, at the same 
time, a separate question as to the character of those books 
which record and contain these truths. This involves 
the doctrine of the inspiration of the Old and New Tes- 
tament. That doctrine affirms a divine and infallible 
character of these writings, as the recorded and author- 
ized Will of God revealed to men. 

Any other book may be perfectly authentic, and strict- 
ly trustworthy and credible, as to its contents, and yet 
be nothing more than the production of an unassisted 
human mind. Or it is possible that a book may contain 
truths, which, for the most part, are of incalculable impor- 
tance, and yet there may be defects in reference to its 
original completeness, or there might be additions which 
are not entitled to perfect credit as parts of the genuine 
authorship. Again, every thing contained in the Bible 
may be allowed to be entirely authentic, so far as the 
composition is concerned, and strictly true, as to the 
veracity of its statements — and without any diminution 
or addition-- and yet these records may by regarded by 
some as only narratives drawn up by men on their own 
responsibility, derived from the resources of their own 



INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 211 

memory, judgment and observation. It becomes, there- 
fore, a peculiarly important question, as to what authori- 
ty belongs to these written records, and what value at- 
taches to the words themselves which entered into the 
original composition of these sacred documents. When 
we are convinced that we hold in our hands just those 
books, and no other, which were given from the hands of 
the writers of the Bible, the authority of inspiration 
obliges us to take for granted that every doctrine which 
is taught, and every proposition which is sanctioned, in 
those books, is infallibly true. 

Section I. Nature of Inspiration as a doctrinal 

proposition. 
It is a doctrine repeatedly set forth in the Scriptures 
themselves, from beginning to end, that the prophets, 
apostles, evangelists and other sacred writers, had such 
supernatural assistance bestowed upon them, that they 
were specially qualified to record divine truth, without 
any mixture of error, or without any liability to mistake. 
The fact of their having divine impressions, sup'ernatur- 
ally acting upon them while writing, is the ground of 
that divine authority which belongs to these sacred 
documents. The shortest form in which we can state 
this question is this : that the divine will either governed 
the understanding, or directed the hand of the Bible 
writers, in composing these sacred documents, which 
were intended for the world through all generations. 

We do not pretend to adopt any of those unwarrant- 
able distinctions which are sometimes made, as to the 



212 INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES* 

degrees or kinds of inspiration which possessed or actu- 
ated the writers of the Bible. There are classifications 
made by some, as to the measure of that direct divine 
influence which the sacred writers possessed, that may 
perhaps serve very good purposes for aiding our distinc- 
tions of thought, but which are presumptuous and un- 
founded when we take them as our rule for receiving 
the various portions of Scripture as of divine authority. 

One degree of inspiration has been called the inspi- 
ration of superintendence, by which it is asserted, the 
sacred writers availed themselves of what they had ac- 
quired by the ordinary means of human experience, and 
were simply overruled and guarded against recording 
any errors of fact, or any thing at variance with the 
doctrine and practice of the Christian life. 

A degree above this, has been called the inspiration 
of direction, by which the writers are believed to have 
been supernaturally influenced only so far as to know 
what they were to select and record, inserting only 
those topics and statements which were agreeable to 
the divine will, and leaving unrecorded a great multitude 
of things which had taken place, and which were equally 
true with what was inserted; but which, for sufficient 
reasons, were not to form a part of the permanent Christ- 
ian documents. Thus far, the sacred writings, simply 
as a record of facts which occurred, have been regarded 
as not going beyond the limits of the human ex 
perience of the writers. 

Ascending another degree above this stage of inspira- 
tion, there has been alleged to be what is called the 



INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 213 

inspiration of elevation, by which the minds of the 
writers were so highly endowed with grand, important 
and spiritual thoughts, that the unaided human facul- 
ties could not be considered equal to the conception of 
such original and wonderful truths — so much beyond 
any of the previous developments and attainments of 
the human mind. Especially it is to be remembered, 
that nearly all of the writers of the New Testament 
were plain, unlettered and undisciplined men, who, if 
left to themselves, never could have risen to that grand- 
eur of conception, by which they delineated characters 
and announced truths, which, in their day, were immea- 
surably in advance of the world. There is a distinctness 
and a condensation of style in the New Testament 
writers, a powerfully suggestive method of statement, 
and a singling out of a small portion of the essential 
parts of a vast mass of materials, which none but the 
highest order of minds are capable of, when writing 
upon the ordinary principles of human composition. 
The brevity and comprehensiveness of the New Testa- 
ment writings, furnish an order of style and statement 
which scarcely the most gifted human intellect could 
attain to, with all the facts in view which lay in the ex- 
perience of the apostles. 

Besides this, some of the New Testament writers 
published their books at periods of from eight or ten, to 
twenty and even sixty years, after the facts occurred in 
the history of our Lord, which these writers describe as 
the professed eye-witnesses. 

If they should have depended simply upon their im~ 



214 INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 

pressions of memory, and their personal conceptions of 
our Saviour's teachings, after all the changes in their 
own experience for a period often to fifty years, before 
they successively recorded what they describe them- 
selves as having witnessed, there*would, in that case, be 
a vague and painful uncertainty in our minds as to 
their ability to set forth the truths declared by our 
Lord, and the facts in his history, exactly in those aspects 
in which they actually transpired, or as they were known 
to our Lord himself. But besides the natural improba- 
bility of the Bible writers being equal to such a work 
as they have left, without superior aid, it is also authen- 
tically attested that, when the truths of Christianity 
were first published, those truths were above any notions 
of excellence then known to the world, and could never 
have been excogitated by the reason of man, without 
the elevating and illuminating influence of direct divine 
assistance. 

Higher up in the same order of degrees, there is what 
has been called the inspiration of suggestion, or of 
direct revelation. By this measure of supernatural com- 
munication there has been imparted to man, it is said, 
a knowledge of things entirely beyond the range of 
human discovery and experience previously known, and 
which no elevation or mere illumination of mind ever 
conceived of. The thoughts and purposes of God, being 
all his own, emanating from his own sovereign and in- 
dependent will, would have been beyond the limit and 
compass even of angelic thought, and never could have 
entered into the conception of any created intelligence, 



INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 215 

unless directly revealed. It was for God alone to origi- 
nate and devise his methods of conduct towards his crea- 
tures ; it was for him to make known the terms by 
which he would hold communication with mankind, 
and the facts of which such communication would con- 
sist ; and therefore, until it was specially revealed to 
man what the will of God might be, his designs and 
doings would be entirely above the thoughts of man to 
conceive, or the power of man to make known. In this 
view of the case, the idea of inspiration involves the 
idea of a distinct, original and independent revelation of 
what was entirely new to those to whom it was imparted. 
If we are to take into account, the nature of those 
truths which originated in the divine and sovereign 
mind, and which were never conceived by man until 
after being disclosed, then such truths may be considered 
as having more of divinity in them, than those simple 
historical narratives, the facts of which were witnessed 
by multitudes of men, besides the writers who have 
recorded them from their own observation. In the case 
of such original knowledge being imparted, it must 
also be allowed that the ivords would necessarily be 
dictated by a special inspiration, as well as the thoughts 
or the facts themselves. For any specific fact, if related 
at all, must be clothed in the specific statements and 
forms of human language. There is no closer connexion 
between spoken words aid the organs which utter them, 
than there is between the thoughts conveyed, and the 
words through whose medium the thoughts are deliv- 
ered. The word is the sign, figure or picture of the 



216 INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES, 

thought. If the word have a wrong meaning, then 
there must be, by so much, a distortion and misrepre 
sentation of the fact. Whatever uncertainty belongs 
to the language, must make the truth intended to be 
conveyed, so far, fallible and equivocal. 

There can be no abstract terms, or any peculiar ce- 
lestial language, apart from human speech, which can 
serve as a channel for conveying truths from another 
realm of existence, to the comprehension of the inhab- 
itants of this world. And, if human language be em- 
ployed for this purpose, it must be such language as is 
suitable to the natural style and manner of men. If it 
were possible to convey a revelation in some one lan- 
guage which was unknown to all nations of a different 
speech, in such case the words would require a literal 
and verbal translation into all those other tongues, be- 
fore it could be fitted to the comprehension of those 
speaking them. 

From these primary and obvious considerations we can 
find a ready explanation of the fact, that there are all 
the characteristic styles in the sacred writers, correspond- 
ing to the thirty different authors of the sixty-six differ- 
ent books in the Bible, and which were successively 
in the course of being published through a period of 
over fifteen hundred years. This individuality of man- 
ner which distinguishes every Bible writer, according to 
the peculiarities of his age, capacity and situation, is 
what must necessarily have taken place, if God in- 
tended to make an intelligible representation of his will 
to human beings, by means of human language. 



INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 21 7 

Supposing the writers to have been of the same num- 
ber which they actually were, and extending through 
the same period of time, and occupying the same local- 
ities which they actually did, and then supposing that 
they had all been directed to use the same uniform lan- 
guage and style, and the same elevation, or the same 
monotony of expression, and the same representation of 
one common theme, and one unvarying order of doctrine 
—every one sees, on such a supposition, that there would 
have been an unfitness and incongruity to the principles 
of our human nature, by which such a revelation would 
have been unavailable for any thing connected with our 
common experience. If a revelation is made at all to 
mankind, it must be conveyed in human language; 
and if several writers are employed to write it, through 
a period of many successive generations, there is an 
obvious propriety in having such an authorized com- 
munication, bearing upon it the characteristic impress of 
minds employed to convey it — and in having those 
marks of time, and place and persons, wrought into its 
composition, which would be agreeable to the known 
principles of human nature in such circumstances. 

Now, it is impossible for us to conceive of the inspi- 
ration of thoughts or truths, being supernaturally com- 
municated, without, at thesame time, conceiving of the 
inspired authorization of the words by which those 
thoughts are to be conveyed. As to the peculiar nature, 
and the mode of operation, by which such inspiration 
is conducted, it is just as difficult for us to comprehend 
how the truths should be inspired, as it would be to 



218 INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 

understand how the language should be inspired. What- 
ever objection, therefore, lies against the inspiration of 
the language, equally lies against the inspiration of the 
truth. It is not an enquiry which properly belongs to 
our condition or capacity, as to what was the particular 
state of mind, or of individual consciousness, on the part 
of those who were employed to write down what God 
intended should bear the authority of inspired Scripture. 
So far as we can know, the personal feelings, motives 
and conscious experience of the Bible writers, may have 
been more, or it may have been less, akin to what be- 
longs to the experience of our common nature. There 
is no need of our attempting to conceive in what man- 
ner the inspired writers were acted upon — whether by 
some oracular ecstasy, or some mysterious elevation of 
mind beyond the bounds of the known exercises of th.3 
human constitution. The prophetical writers were un- 
doubtedly introduced into a circle of vision, and were 
placed in a medium of communication, beyond all ordi- 
nary human experience; and therefore, it is entirely 
beyond our legitimate province to explain the modes of 
supernatural inspiration. It was a case of miraculous 
intervention and superintendence, and therefore beyond 
our means of comprehension. 

God does not make known to us the deep counsels of 
his own mind, nor the modes by which he operates in 
creating and governing the work of his hands. In this 
case, all that he requires, and all that we can do, is that 
we accept his works as he presents them to our senses 
and our understanding. For the same reasons, when he 



INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 219 

reveals his will, he simply requires us to receive what he 
reveals, and act according to it, without attempting to 
go farther back, in order to pry into those operations, 
the modes of which are not legitimate subjects for the 
capacities of the human mind. We only know the fact, 
from many repeated declarations of the Scriptures, that 
God did communicate, in some direct and personal way, 
with those selected and inspired persons whom he em- 
ployed as the organs for revealing his will. 

This special action upon the faculties of the Bible 
writers, by revealing, dictating and suggesting to them 
what they should write, and by directing and superin- 
tending the utterance of their words, or the execution 
of their penmanship, is not to be confounded with that 
influence of the Holy Spirit, by which the thoughts of 
a Christian are operated upon, under the ordinary sanc- 
tifying power of the Holy Spirit. A holy and heavenly- 
minded man, in the exercises of prayer and faith, and 
in the enjoyment of spiritual affections, may have 
thoughts inspired within him, which are truly and pro- 
perly the work of God. He may know much in this 
way, which reason cannot reveal ; and which never could 
be attained through any avenue of his senses, or by any 
agency of his own, or of any other created beings. But 
when we are told that God has singled out and inspired 
a certain number of his chosen creatures, as the vehicles 
or channels through which he has designed to impart 
a knowledge of his will, by a communication which is 
to bear the impress of supernatural and divine authority, 
in such a case, we are to regard the inspired agents as 



220 INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 

invested with an infallible and divine commission ; and 
the words they ntter are to be received as the will of 
God, though conveyed in human language and by the 
agency of human organs. Here is the limit to our in- 
vestigations in this direction. All that we can do, is to 
hear those claims to inspiration which the Bible writers 
assert for these sacred books. 

Sec. II. Character of Inspiration as asserted in the 
Scriptures. 
We find, running throughout the Bible, many de- 
clarations which assert that the writings therein con- 
tained were the result of a direct command of the 
Almighty to reduce them to writing. Thus we find 
Moses saying, towards the close of those five books which 
bear his name, that the Almighty commanded him to 
write these things and teach them to the children of 
Israel.* Our Lord, in his own day, recognized the re- 
ceived classification among the Jews , by which the sacred 
writings of the Old Testament were divided into three 
parts, called " the law of Moses, and the prophets, and 
the psalms."f Here we see that all the reputed writings 
of Moses are acknowledged as being the written com- 
mands of the Almighty, or an authorized inspired history 
of the divine government. Following up this method 
of division, which our Lord has sanctioned, we find that 
the same is also true of the writers of the psalms, which 
Moses had declared of himself. Thus we find David 

* Deut. 31 : 19-22. Luke 24 : 44. 



INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 221 

saying,* "The Spirit of the Lord spoke by me, and his 
word was in my tongue." But to give the instances in 
which these writers of the Old Testament claimed in- 
spired authority for themselves, would be to repeat the 
preface to nearly every speech and recorded prophecy 
in those ancient books. They generally begin by saying, 
" Thus saith the Lord." And in a more specific man- 
ner, God delegated his prophets in some such way, as 
that which is recorded of Moses,f " And the Lord said 
unto him, who hath made man's mouth? * * * 
Have not I, the Lord ? Now, therefore, go, and I will be 
with thy mouth, and teach thee what thou shalt say." 

But it is evident that the Scriptures collectively assert 
the same inspiration and authority as belonging to all 
the Old Testament writings, which Moses, in a particular 
case, claimed for himself. Ail the Old Testament books 
are either grouped under the general divisions which the 
apostles sometimes called by the appellation of " Moses 
and the prophets," or are known by the designation, 
elsewhere used by our Saviour, of " Moses, the prophets, 
and the psalms." Collectively considered, they are often 
called in the New Testament by the name of " the 
oracles of God."J The sacred character which is thus 
collectively assigned by the writers of the New Tes- 
tament, to the writings of the Old, is in general keep- 
ing with the specific claims to inspiration which the 
ancient prophets predicated of themselves. Thus we 
find, for example, Ezekiel asserting that the Almighty 

* 2 Sam. 23 : 2. t Exodus 4: 11, 12, 

t Acts 7 : 38. Rom. 3 : 2. Heb. 5 1 12. 



222 INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 

directed him, in these words,* " Son of man, go, and 
speak my words to them ; speak to them, and say to 
them, that the Lord, the eternal, hath thus spoken." 
And the same was said to Jeremiah :f "Lo, I have put 
my words in thy mouth ;" and the prophetic commis- 
sions generally ran in the same, or in kindred expressions. 

We therefore find that, in the days of Jesus Christ 
and his apostles, the whole of the writings of the 
Old Testament were gathered together into one collec- 
tion, which, however subdivided, were called by the 
general name of " Scripture,"J or " the Scriptures,"§ 
or "The Holy Scriptures.'* || These Holy Scriptures 
collectively, are the same concerning which an inspired 
apostle declares, " All Scripture is given by inspiration 
of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for 
correction, for instruction in righteousness ; that the man 
of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all 
good works."^[ The Apostle Peter declares to the same 
effect, " No prophecy of the Scripture is of any private 
interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time 
by the will of man ; but holy men of God spoke as they 
were moved by the Holy Ghost."** 

It is a fact here to be mentioned, that the books of 
the Old Testament, which are thus called " the Holy 
Scriptures," by the New Testament writers, were the 
same in name and number, and in all other respects, 



*Ezek. 4t 10, 11. tJer. 1 1-9, J John 19: 37. 
§ John 5: 39, || 2 Tim. 3 : 14, 15. 

«j[2Tim. 3: 16,17. ** 2 Pet. 1: 20 11. 



INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 223 

with those books which are at present in our hands tin- 
der tbe name of the Old Testament. Although this is 
a separate question, properly relating to the authorship 
of the Old Testament books, yet it materially belongs 
to our purpose here, in order to show that there is col- 
lateral testimony of the most genuine kind, that the 
Old Testament Scriptures which were recognized by our 
Lord and his apostles, were precisely the same, neither 
more nor less, with those which had been received 
amongst the ancient Jews for many centuries before. 
Josephus, who was born in the year A. D. 37, was in 
his thirtieth year, when the Apostle Paul wrote the 
second epistle to Timothy; and this writing of the 
apostle, was evidently his last epistle, being written in 
the year A D. 66. It was in this last writing of the 
apostle, in which he makes his general summary, by 
saying, "All Scripture is given by inspiration of God." 
Paul's contemporary, Josephus — whose authority is 
valid alike with Jews and Christians, and who wrote 
not to confirm Christianity, but to leave a standard his- 
torical work, under the patronage of the Roman govern- 
ment — has given an enumeration, which makes the re- 
ceived books in our version of the Old Testament pre- 
cisely the same as those which, he says, his countrymen, 
the Jews, had always claimed to be inspired and divine. 
He distinguishes these sacred books, from all other his- 
tories and writings of whatever kind which had been 
written from the time of Artaxerxes II, about four hun- 
dred and twenty years before Christ, and about which 
time the inspired books of the Old Testament were fin- 



224 INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 

ished, with the prophecy of Malachi. It is concerning 
these books that Josephus bears his separate and au- 
thentic testimony in these words : " How firmly we have 
given credit to these books of our nation, is evident 
from what we do : for during so many ages as have al- 
ready passed, no one hath been so bold as either to add 
anything to them, to take anything from them, or to 
make any change in them : for it is for all Jews a thought 
born with them, and from their earliest infancy, to esteem 
these books to contain divine oracles, and to persist in 
them, and, if occasion be, willing to die for them." And 
Josephus afterwards adds: "These books are given us 
by the inspiration which comes from God."* 

Having thus seen the evidence, that the Old Testa- 
ment claims a constant authority of inspiration for itself, 
and that this character is everywhere attributed to it 
in the New Testament, we may return to the considera- 
tion of what that inspiration is, which these Scriptures 
claim for themselves. It is not intended to assert that 
every sentiment and saying, recorded in the Scriptures, 
is inserted for our approval and imitation. The sayings 
and doings of wicked men form a considerable part in 
some of the recorded narratives of the sacred writings. 
There are many sentiments and sayings, there inserted, 
which were never intended for commendation, or for 
an example, by being there registered. An action, or 
an opinion, which is bad in itself, is made nothing bet- 
ter, by being recorded in the history of the Bible. The 
bad actions occasionally committed by good men, are in 
* Josephus. Contra Apion. Book 1, Sect. 7, 8. 



INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES, 225 

no way alleviated, and in no case intended to mislead or 
to justify us in a course of similar transgression, because 
they are noticed in that holy book. That book con- 
tains a true, impartial and infallible description of hu- 
man nature and of human history, in all its lights and 
shades, with all that is bad, together with whatever is 
good, in the characters which it describes. There are 
many human characters, and in some instances demoni- 
acal spirits, introduced as speaking, in some parts of the 
Bible, which can furnish us with no warrant for receiv- 
ing the same sayings and doings as any rule for our 
belief or practice. Even what good men are described 
as having said or done, furnishes no infallible rule for 
our conduct, unless it is clearly intimated in the Bible 
that such conduct was intended for our invariable imita- 
tion ; or unless it is in some way intimated or com- 
manded as a precept, and set forth as a precedent. But 
the Almighty had reasons sufficient, in view of his own 
wisdom, why we should be made acquainted with those 
events which took place, and with those characters, 
whether bad or good, which are inserted in the Bible. 
The Scriptures set forth many things which we are to 
avoid, as well as many things which we are to copy 
after. But there are eternal and unalterable principles 
of rectitude and truth in the Bible, by which every thing 
is to be estimated, whether in the recorded conduct of 
those persons whose lives are narrated in the Scriptures, or 
whether it be in our own conduct, for the regulation of 
which the Bible is given as a directory of faith and 
practice. 
IS 



226 INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 

There are some instances of individuals, mentioned 
in the Scriptures, who were commissioned to utter 
prophecies, but whose personal character is to be viewed 
as entirely apart from their commission. Hence, the 
prophet Balaam, by a movement upon his will which 
he could not control, uttered expressions which declared 
the mind of God, and which were just as infallible as if 
Balaam had been a holy man. The same was true of 
Saul, the profane king of Israel, who prophesied what 
it was not in his heart to believe or to do. So also of 
David ; there was one period of his life when he was 
guilty of the twofold crime of murder and adultery. 
But his ungodly conduct, at one stage of his career, did 
not affect the character of his commission, during the 
long time in which he sustained the official ministry of 
the king and oracle of God's people ; for he was not 
only the sweet singer of the Psalms, but was an author- 
ised prophet to reveal the mind of God to men. When 
Solomon fell into idolatry, the baseness of his conduct 
did not affect the value of what he had elsewhere and 
at other times revealed as the authorised scribe and 
prophet of the Almighty, under his own express and 
positive sanction and command. 

Nor are we to imagine that the holy apostles, under 
the clearer light of the New Testament revelation, were 
always exempted from mistake and imperfection in their 
every action under ordinary circumstances. These men 
were indeed holy, but they were human ; and when not 
expressly acting by a divine commission, they were liable 
to mistakes, which, when at any time recorded in the 



INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 22 7 

Scriptures, are to have no more claim to our imitation, 
than mistakes which are recorded of any other men. 
Thus, for example, the Apostle Paul acknowledged that 
he had made a mistake, in not knowing who the high 
priest was, when he uttered his honest indignation, by 
saying to the high priest, M God shall smite thee, thou 
whited wall."* The same acknowledged imperfection 
was exhibited amongst several of the apostles, when it 
is recorded of them, that at Jerusalem, " the contention 
was so sharp between them, that they departed one 
from another."f At another time, when Peter and 
some of the disciples had been carried away by Jewish 
dissimulation at Antioch, Paul was compelled to pub- 
licly remonstrate with them, and he says of Peter, " I 
withstood him to the face, because he was to be 
blamed."]; 

This subject, as to the nature of the inspiration, will 
be cleared of its difficulties when we notice that there 
was an express commission which governed the sacred 
writers, in what they were directed to record, and that 
commission had all the nature and effect of a supernat- 
ural and miraculous guarantee, while they were acting 
in that capacity. Their inspiration was intermitted and 
suspended when they were not acting under an express 
and authorised commission. The various degrees of 
personal holiness and of excellence which were possess- 
ed by different writers, and by the same writers at dif- 
ferent times, could in no way modify the authority of 

* Acts 23: 3. t Acts 15: 89. X Gal. 3:11. 



228 INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 

those communications which they were uttering or re- 
cording in the name of the Lord. According to our 
modes of conception, it would indeed have required a 
higher measure of supernatural endowment to have 
enabled the prophets to disclose the special counsels of 
the Almighty, and to announce minutely many events 
which were to come to pass in long future ages, than 
what was required simply to record the narratives of 
those historical events, of which many of the Bible 
writers were the personal eye-witnesses. But these 
limitations of the modes and degrees of inspiration in 
the Scriptures, are to be referred only to our personal 
conceptions, and not to the authority by which God has 
enacted, that all the sacred and canonical Scriptures are 
to be received as the inspired account of his own re- 
vealed will, and the history of his providence. 

We have, then, the position of the subject clearly de- 
fined, by admitting, on the one hand, the limited meas- 
ure of natural capacity, as well as of supernatural 
endowment in the Bible writers ; and, on the other 
hand, by receiving the entire Scriptures as equally, in 
every part and portion, the inspired record of the di- 
vine mind, attested by infallible marks of his sanction 
and authority. The one view — on the human side — 
may be thus summed up in the following brief state- 
ment of Bishop Lincoln : " In some cases, inspiration 
only produces correctness and accuracy in relating past 
occurrences, or in reciting the words of others ; in other 
cases, it communicated ideas not only new and unknown 
before, but infinitely beyond the reach of unassisted 



INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 229 

human intellect ; and sometimes inspired prophets de- 
livered predictions for the use of future ages which they 
did not themselves comprehend, and which cannot be 
fully understood till they are accomplished."* 

But the other view of this subject — as on the divine 
side — requires us to look at the whole book of God's 
word, just as we view the book of nature and creation, 
all the parts of which, whether we regard them as 
more or less important, are the product of his omipo- 
tent hand. There are mysteries and apparent discrep- 
ancies in nature; but no one, who believes in God, can 
doubt that nature, just as it is spread out before us, is 
the work of God alone. So also of his word. He has 
set the marks of miraculous and supernatural attesta- 
tion upon its authorship. We are to take it, in all its 
contents, and use this word according to the laws ap- 
pointed for its application and interpretation ; just as we 
take the facts of nature, and use them according to the 
laws which God has impressed upon the constitution of 
things as we find them. May we have the same occa- 
sion to thank God, for our fidelity in receiving what he 
has inspired, which an apostle had, when speaking in 
behalf of the Thessalonians : " For this cause also 
thank we God, without ceasing, because when ye re- 
ceived the word of God which ye heard of us, ye 
received it not as the word of men, but (as it is in truth) 
the word of God, which effectually worketh also in you 
that believe." 

* Introduction to the Study of the Bible. Chap. I, p, 16. 



230 INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 

Sec. III. Inspiration of the Scriptures attested by 
miracles. 

The inspired authority of those sacred books, which 
were the received Scriptures in the time of the Saviour 
and his apostles, was attested by the immediate sanction 
of miracles. 

The argument will, therefore, primarily apply, in this 
place, to the Old Testament, insomuch as the writings 
of that ancient book were those which our Saviour and 
his apostles designated by the term Scripture, or the 
Scriptures, before the New Testament was written. 
The doctrine of miracles being established as an infalli- 
ble standard of authenticating the mission of those who 
set up a claim of being inspired teachers, it must 
be at once admitted, that whatever was done and what- 
ever was taught in connexion with the immediate per- 
formance of a miracle to attest it, would have to be 
received as bearing upon it the broad seal of the divine 
sanction and authority. God never delegated his om- 
nipotent sanctions to any one, in order to teach a false- 
hood. The exercise of omnipotent energy, therefore, in 
connexion with the announcement of a truth, would 
bespeak the wisdom and the truth of God, as much as 
the miracles would bespeak his power. 

Here then we have a short summary, and the sub- 
stance of the whole argument of miracles, considered as 
a part of the evidences of Christianity. Our belief in 
every thing derivable from the Scriptures, and which 
could not have been excogitated by reason, or gathered 
from the teachings of nature, rests upon the sanction of 



INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 231 

miracles. And this evidence is complete. The narra- 
tives and the proofs of miracles are embodied and wrap- 
ped up throughout the whole texture of the sacred 
writings, from beginning to end. We may, accordingly, 
see how short and easy is our method of establishing 
the doctrine of inspiration in behalf of our sacred books. 

The doctrine of inspiration rests, just as all the pecu- 
liar and prominent doctrines of Christianity do, upon 
the authority of Christ and his apostles, attesting their 
truth by personal declaration, and by the sanction of 
miracles. In other words, we have no stronger reasons 
for believing any specific doctrine of the gospel, than we 
have for believing the doctrine of inspiration. It is a 
doctrine repeatedly asserted in the ISTew Testament, 
and it is clearly stated and often asserted in the Old 
Testament. There is probably no doctrine peculiar to 
the gospel, that is set forth in a more manifold form of 
statement, than the doctrine in question. Nothing is 
more specifically stated in the Bible, concerning Jesus 
Christ, or concerning the method of salvation, or the 
future world, than the specific declaration, that the ac- 
credited Scriptures were given by the inspiration of the 
Almighty ; in other words, that the writers were directed 
to prepare those books, just as they were given forth. 

The method of corroborating this statement is short, 
plain and easy. It is a fact already demonstrated, that 
there was one complete collection of sacred books, re- 
cognized and spoken of, by our Saviour and his apostles, 
under the several names of u the Scripture," " the 
Scriptures," and " the holy Scriptures." That this col- 



232 INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 

lection, now referred to, was the same in all respects as 
the Old Testament, which we have in our hands at the 
present day, is capable of being confirmed beyond any 
reasonable doubt. That case can be made out by the 
course of arguments adduced in favor of the authority 
of the Scriptures/" 

Sec. IV. Collateral sanctions to the identity of the 
inspired Scriptures. 

Besides the fact of the credit of the Old Testament 
being entirely implicated and involved in the credit of 
the genuineness of the New Testament — and besides 
the collateral testimony of the Jewish historians, such 
as Josephus and Philo, and their many commentators 
under the name of Rabbins and Talmudists, all of whom 
have verified the genuineness of the Old Testament 
apart from, and entirely independent of, any Christian 
testimony on that subject — we have, in addition to all such 
sufficient sources of evidence, some very striking modern 
confirmations of the perfect and uncorrupted condition 
of the ancient text of the Old Testament Scriptures. 

This confirmation is found in much of that history of 
the Jews, which has been hidden from the knowledge 
of the world, and known only to themselves, until very 
recent times. The discovery of the Samaritan Penta- 
teuch, about two hundred years ago, was a wonderful 
and unexpected confirmation of the original identity of 

* The illustrations on the subject of authority, in Chapter III, 
referred more to the New Testament than to the Old, chiefly for 
the sake of simplicity and brevity of discussion. 



%% 



INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 233 

the first five books of the Old Testament — showing, be- 
yond any reasonable question, that the Pentateuch as 
we have received it, was the same from which the 
Samaritan people had originally formed their version. 
Sequestered and shut off from any intercourse with the 
rest of the world, for a period of twenty-three hundred 
years, the remains of those ancient Samaritans have, 
from age to age, still clung to their abode in Sichem of 
Palestine, and to the ruins of their temple in Mount 
Gerizim. There, the successors and representatives of 
the ancient Samaritans are still to be found, as seques- 
tered in location, and as unmixed in genealogy, as ever ; 
and the Mosaic Pentateuch is embodied in the language 
and institutions which have descended to them from many 
generations before the Christian era."* The tests of 
agreement thus afforded, give us the means of verify" 
ing the identity of those books as they were originally 
written by Moses. Whatever variations have been 
made from the readings, common to both the Hebrew 
and the Samaritan Scriptures, have, undoubtedly, been 
in the Samaritan version and not in the Hebrew. For 
the disagreements between the two versions, wherever 
they occur, can be detected at the point of departure, 
in the Samaritan version. The Samaritans were left to 
follow down a single line of transmission, thus copy- 
ing and reproducing any errors that might occur. The 
received Hebrew Scriptures, on the other hand, were 
always guarded from the insertion of errors, and their 

* Robinson's Researches, vol. 3 : 97 — 134. Boston edition, 1841. 



284 INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 

transmission was equally guarantied by numerous col- 
lateral methods of criticism. They have thus been 
brought down to us through many parallel lines of 
transmission ; and by the independent as well as the 
united testimony of witnesses, who have accredited the 
literal integrity of the Hebrew Scriptures as they were 
originally given. 

But modern research and criticism, especially during 
the present century, have shown us how complete is the 
evidence that the ancient text of the Old Testament, as 
received by us, is the same as that collection which was 
spoken of, in the days of the Lord, as a the Scriptures." 
About forty-five years ago, the intrepid and benevolent 
Claudius Buchanan, while visiting the race of black 
Jews of Malabar, on the western peninsula of India, 
discovered that remarkable manuscript, which was after- 
wards deposited in the University of Cambridge, in 
England. It was an immense roll of thirty-seven 
parchments, which, when properly put together, it was 
computed, would make one scroll of about ninety feet 
long and twenty-two inches wide. There was only one 
break in it, thus leaving out a part of Deuteronomy 
and the book of Leviticus, but the whole contents of 
the Old Testament were otherwise complete. It has 
been thoroughly examined, word by word and letter by 
letter, by the most critical censors of ancient manuscripts ; 
and by comparing it with the received Hebrew text, 
there were found to be only about forty trifling verbal 
variations, which consisted in the contraction and change 
of the "jots and tittles" of the text, but in none of 



INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 235 

these cases was the value of the words or the signifi- 
cance of the sense affected. There was every evidence 
upon the face of that document, that it had never been 
copied from any more ancient copies of the Old Testa- 
ment received from Jews or Christians of the western 
nations, in preceding times ; and although written by 
different hands, it had evidently been constructed under 
those rules for copying the Old Testament documents, 
which have been elsewhere noticed as the means for 
authenticating the Scriptures previously to the introduc- 
tion of Christianity. 

Those Masoretic rules, as they were called, were regu- 
lated by a table of arithmetical numbers ; so that by it, 
the number of verses, and then of words, and also of 
letters, was counted in each separate book. By apply- 
ing the table to the manuscript, the precise identity of 
every particle would be at once recognised ; or if there 
was the slightest inaccuracy, it would be immediately 
detected. The same test was applied to the collective 
books under the general name of the Bible. We can 
see how consummate was this method of verbal criti- 
cism, and how complete a guard it was against the cor- 
ruption of the text. Thus, for example, in applying 
such a table for verifying the literal integrity of our 
English version, the letter A would be found 42,3 7*7 
times in the Bible; the letter B in 38,218 instances ; 
and all the other letters have been classified in the same 
way. So far as our translations are concerned, there 
may be but little profit in using such classification of 
words and letters, although such investigations have 



236 INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES, 

sometimes been made, even in our English versions. 
But such a painstaking process will give an impressive 
idea of the perfection of those methods by which the 
appointed copyists, amongst the ancients, so religioasly 
guarded the literal integrity of their sacred books. It 
is found that, in our English Bible, we have 66 books, 
1,189 chapters, 31,173 verses, 773,746 words, and 
3,565,480 letters. The middle chapter of the whole 
Bible, and also the shortest, is the 11 7th Psalm; and 
the middle verse of the whole Bible is the 8th verse of 
the 118th Psalm. The mere pleasure of -curiosity, in 
making such a laborious calculation, in our version, 
would not be profit enough to pay for the pains. But 
the examples will serve to illustrate the nature of those 
Masoretic tables which were of such incalculable impor- 
tance, amongst the ancient Jews, in verifying and guard- 
ing the accuracy of all copies of the sacred books when 
written on parchment. The Jews could thus tell at 
once the middle word of each particular book, and the 
middle word of all the books when taken collectively 
and not only the middle word, but the middle letter, of 
each book. Thus, by counting backwards and forwards 
through all these subdivisions, whether large or small, 
they could at once detect an error of a single letter at 
any point; and so carefully were their manuscripts 
guarded, that if a single erasure was required, the parch- 
ment itself was cast aside, and the whole work would 
have to be done over again on another parchment. 

It may be sufficient here to state, very briefly, that 
the laborious researches of many of the greatest scholars 



INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 237 

of modern times, who have given their lives to the sub- 
ject, have made no discovery of any discrepancies which 
would discredit the genuineness of the ancient Hebrew 
Scriptures. Dr. Kennicott compared 581 ancient He- 
brew manuscripts ; Professor Rossi, 680 ; while Michaelis, 
and other critics of equal acumen and industry, having 
all gone over the same ground again and again, have 
been enabled to vindicate the proofs for the perfect preser- 
vation of that ancient written text which has been copied so 
many thousand times, from periods before our Saviour's 
time down to the present day. After the versions, 
gathered up from libraries and convents among the 
various sects in Europe, Asia and Africa, have been 
minutely compared by numberless critics, and their re- 
searches have been unweariedly carried through the 
records of 1800 years, they have been able to discover 
no variations of reading, which could invalidate any 
previously received and settled passage. The modifica- 
tions never affected the thought or the substance of the 
idea ; and wherever such variations were found, few as 
they were, they were only the slight verbal contractions, 
or additions or omissions, of trifling particles and letters. 
We have thus seen, in a very brief and summary way, 
how perfect is the reliance which we can place upon the 
identity of the Old Testament Scriptures ; and that the 
version, which we use, is the same collection of them 
which was used and sanctioned by our Lord and his 
apostles. And we have also seen, that the attestation of 
miracles was constantly employed, by our Lord and his 
apostles, while proving their claims as bearing a divine 



238 INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 

commission. It was one part of their sacred commis- 
sion, to give a uniform endorsement to all those ancient 
Scriptures, which they declared were given by the in- 
spiration and authority of the Almighty, 

Sec. Y. Inspiration of the Old Testament asserted in 
the Neiv Testament. 
The inspiration of the Old Testament writings was 
constantly asserted by the New Testament writers. 
Those writings, as we have already noticed, were often 
called, by the authors of the New Testament, by the 
name of "the oracles of God;" or sometimes " Moses 
and the prophets ;" and again, " Moses, the prophets 
and the psalms." Thus, for example, we find our Lord 
attributing the books of the Pentateuch, written by 
Moses, to the immediate inspiration of God — thus making 
the words of Moses to be the words of the Almighty — 
as appears in a case like this : " Have ye not read that 
which was spoken unto you by God, saying, I am the 
God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God 
of Jacob ;"* and yet, though written by Moses, all this, 
our Lord says, was spoken by God. In the same chap- 
ter our Saviour speaks "of David, in spirit, calling him 
Lord."* Our Lord often repeats such expressions as 
these : " The Lord who said by the mouth of his servant 
David ;" " the Holy Ghost spake by the mouth of 
David ;" " Well spake the Holy Ghost by Esaias the 
prophet, saying," — 

* Matt. 22 : 31, 32. t Matt. 22 : 43. 



INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 239 

The manner in which those ancient Scriptures were 
spoken of by our Lord, and applied by him to himself, 
may be seen in such passages as the following : "All 
things must be fulfilled which were written in the law 
of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the psalms, con- 
cerning me."* So, also, of the New Testament writers 
generally ; they speak of the authors of the Old Testa- 
ment, books collectively, as the prophets ; as, for exam- 
ple, we find it said that God " spake by the mouth of 
his holy prophets, which have been since the world 
began."f 

It is by these direct modes of expression, that the doc- 
trine of inspiration is often asserted in the New Testa- 
ment ; as Peter says that " prophecy came not in old 
time, by the will of man, but holy men of God spake as 
they were moved by the Holy Ghost." J So, also, when 
the peculiar term " Scripture" is used by the New Tes- 
tament writers, it is obvious, from its connexion in such 
cases, that it embraces the summary of those writings 
which have been revealed for the faith and practice ot 
Christians ; and it comprehends the whole canonical 
law which was embodied in the received sacred writings. 
It is in such connexions that the New Testament 
authority repeatedly asserts, that " all Scripture is given 
by inspiration of God, and it is profitable for doctrine, 
for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteous- 
ness ; that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly 
furnished unto all good works."§ 

* Luke 24 : 44, t Luke 1 : 70. X 2. Peter 1 : 81. 

§2 Tim, 3: 16-17. 



240 INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 

Sec. VI. The authors of the New Testament claim 
inspiration for their own writings. 

We find that the books of the New Testament, espe- 
cially the epistles, are generally prefaced by declarations 
similar to those by which the ancient prophets asserted 
their own inspiration. The prophets generally chal- 
lenged for their message, such solemn asseverations as 
this — " Thus saith the Lord ;" " The word of the Lord 
came unto me, saying." So, in the New Testament, 
we rind an apostle beginning his epistle by saying, 
"Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ, by the commandment 
of God, our Saviour." But, in asserting the inspiration 
of the doctrines which they taught, and the records 
which they wrote, the apostles claimed a joint and equal 
authority for what they wrote, with what had already 
been written in the ancient Scriptures. Hence we find 
them saying of that system of divine truth which they 
were employed in establishing, that it was built upon 
the foundation of the apostles and prophets."* And 
we find an apostle admonishing his readers in such 
words as these : " That ye may be mindful of the words 
which were spoken before of the holy prophets, and of 
the commandment of us, the apostles of the Lord and 
Saviour."f 

The endowment of inspiration was the subject of our 
Lord's special promises to his disciples, before they were 
entrusted with the responsibility of their public apostle- 
ship. It was first promised to the apostles, in reference 
to the inspired assistance which they should receive 

*Eph,2:2Q. t 2 Pet 3: 2. 



INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 241 

under the direful persecutions which they were to suffer 
after Jesus should leave them. Thus at one time he 
said, u When they deliver you up, take no thought 
what or how ye shall speak; for it shall be given you in 
that same hour what ye shall speak."* And again, "For 
the Holy Ghost shall teach you in the same hour what 
ye ought to say ; for it is not ye that speak, but the 
spirit of your Father which speaketh in you."f And 
again, u I will give you a mouth and wisdom which all 
your adversaries shall not gainsay nor resist."J Such 
were some of the specific assurances that the apostles 
were to be supernaturally aided in their utterance of 
truth when the spirit of inspiration should be imparted 
to them. At the same time, inspired authority was be- 
stowed by our Lord upon the apostles, when he addressed 
Peter, in the name of his associates, "I will give unto 
thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven ; and what- 
soever thou shalt bind on earth, shall be bound in heaven ; 
and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth, shall be loosed 
in heaven."§ The" same plenarv and inspired authority 
was bestowed upon all the apo3tles collectively in the 
following promise, where the precise words addressed to 
Peter in the singular, are repeated to' all the apostles 
together. j| 

It was a leading doctrine ' which our Lord taught 
his disciples, that the Holy Spirit was the divine person- 
ality who was to take his place, after his departure from 

* Matt. 10 : 19. t Luke 12 :11 , 12. t Luke 21 : 15. 

§Matr. 16: 19. |] Matt. 18 : 18. 

16 



242 INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 

the world. He was to be present with them, invisibly, 
as the Lord had formerly been personally and visibly ; and 
He was to be the guide in all their instructions, to recall 
all things to their recollection, and to show them things 
of the future world. The personality of the Holy Spirit 
was asserted by our Lord in such declarations as these : 
" When He, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide 
you into all truth ; for he shall not speak of himself; but 
whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak, and he 
will show you things to coine."* Concerning the per- 
sonal agency of the Holy Spirit, our Lord repeatedly 
declared to his apostles, " He shall teach you all things, 
and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever 
I have said unto you."f Again, it was often said by our 
Lord, that the Spirit "shall take of mine, and shall 
show it unto you ;" and, " he will show you greater 
things than these." 

Such were some of the promises by which the apos- 
tles were authorised to expect a plenary and supernatural 
inspiration. In connexion with these promises, they 
were commissioned to preach the gospel, and to reveal 
truth, which should be attested by miracles. "And 
Jesus spake unto them, saying, all power is given unto 
me in heaven and in earth. Go ye, therefore, and teach 
all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, 
and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost ; teaching them 
to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded 
you ; and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end 

.. * John 16: 13. . tJohnl4:26. 



INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 243 

of the world."* And when, on another occasion, he re- 
peated this commission, in a different form, he said, 
" Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to 
every creature ; he that believeth and is baptized shall 
be saved ; but he that believeth not shall be damned."f 
The sacred writer adds, that the confirmation of the 
apostles' commission was verified in the fact, that they 
were, at once, endowed with the power of working 
miracles : " and they went forth and preached every- 
where, the Lord working with them, and confirming the 
word with signs following."]; 

After our Lord had instructed his disciples, for forty 
days, from his resurrection till his ascension, he gave 
them his final blessing, and invested them with the 
supernatural and miraculous power of inspiration — 
which he guarantied by saying, " As my Father hath 
sent me, even so send I you. And when he had said 
this, he breathed on them and saith unto them, receive 
ye the Holy Ghost ; whosesoever sins ye remit, they are 
remitted unto them ; and whosesoever sins ye retain, 
they are retained."§ The apostles were then directed 
not to depart from Jesusalem, but to wait for the pro- 
mise of the Father, || until they should have received 
"power from on high." When, therefore, after the 
lapse of ten days, the day of Pentecost had fully come, 
"they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began 
to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them 

* Matt. 28 : 19, 20. t Mark 16:17. t Mark 16 : 20. 
§ John 20: 21-23. || Acts 1:4. 



244 INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 

utterance.* From that time onward, the apostles went 
forth everywhere, proclaiming the gospel ; and when- 
ever any one of them had a special work to execute, 
the direct sanction and agency of the Holy Spirit is 
commonly mentioned as the divine testimonial to their 
work. An example of this, appears in the case of the 
Apostle Paul, withstanding and punishing the sorcery 
of Elymas— Paul, "being filled with the Holy Ghost," 
as elsewhere the apostles are said to speak, " by the 
Holy Ghost.'' When the apostles were collectively as 
sembled in a general council at Jerusalem, they sane 
tioned their declarations concerning Christian doctrine, 
by saying, "It seemed good lo the Holy Ghost and to 
us."f At later periods, in all their preaching and in all 
iheir writings, they thus certify the inspiration of what 
they announce : " Which things also we speak, not in 
the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the 
Holy Ghost teacheth ."J The Apostle Paul thus de- 
clares concerning himself: " And my speech and my 
preaching was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, 
but in demonstration of the Spirit and power/'! 

Such is the tenor of the New Testament writers, con- 
cerning that authority of inspiration, by which they 
were singly and collectively directed to write down the 
divine records, which were to be the oracles of truth 
for all matters of faith and practice, through all coming 
times. When Paul had finished his writings, and they 
had been received among all the other apostles and by 

* Acts 2: 4. t Acts 15: 28. t 1 Cor. 2 : 13. §1 Cor. 2:4. 



INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 245 

all the churches, as authenticated inspired truth, he 
placed a plenaiy endorsement iu his last epistle, which 
asserted the divinely inspired character of all that he 
had previously written. Paul was put to death in the 
12th year of Nero, which was some time in the year 
A. D. 66. It was in that year that the second epistle 
to Timothy was written, not long before the apostle's 
own death, and in that epistle he records his closing 
attestation, by an endorsement which embraced all the 
previous apostolic writings : "All Scripture is given by 
inspiration of God." It was in the latter end of that 
same year, or in the beginning of the next, namely, in A. 
D. 67, that the Apostle Peter, in reviewing his associate 
Apostle Paul, bears this testimony to Paul's writings, in 
his second epistle : " And account that the long suffer- 
ing of our Lord is salvation ; even as our beloved brother 
Paul also, according to the wisdom given unto him, 
hath written unto you ; as also in all his epistles speak- 
ing in them of these things ; in which are some things 
hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned 
[unteachable] and unstable wrest, as they do also the 
other Scriptures, unto their own destruction."* 

Wheu Peter wrote his last epistle, the whole of the 
New Testament stood complete, with the exception of 
the short epistle of Jude, and the writings of the Apostle 
John. When John was at the point of finishing his 
book which is called the Revelation, he uttered a sol- 
emn warning against any addition, alteration or dimi- 

2 Peter 3: 15, 16. 



246 INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 

nution of what lie had written by divine inspiration. 
Whether the Apocalypse was written before or after his 
three epistles, he sealed up the authority of his writings 
by a declaration, which would apply equally to the single 
character of that book, or to all the sacred and canoni- 
cal books when regarded collectively. These are the sol- 
emn words which make the final sentences of the New 
Testament, in the last verses of John : " If any man 
shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the 
plagues which are written in this book : and if any man 
shall take away from the words of the book of this pro- 
phecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of 
life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which 
are written in his book."* 

"We can thus see how the Scriptures were successively 
written under the guidance of divine inspiration, and 
how they were gathered into one collection, under the 
canonical name of the Scriptures, or the Holy Bible. 
They were attested by miraculous authority through all 
the period when they were in the course of being writ- 
ten : and as soon as they were collected into one volume, 
the evidence for their authority becomes simply a matter 
of authenticity and genuineness, according to our illus- 
trations on that subject, in the chapter on authenticity. 
Here is the point where the first link begins in that 
chain of unbroken testimony for the proofs of the au- 
thenticity of the Scriptures, from their first publication 
to the present time. 

*Rev. 22: 18,19. 



INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 247 

We have the testimony of other writers, some of 
whom were contemporaries with the apostles, and who 
speak of the inspired books as soon, almost, as they were 
written, under those names which have always denoted 
their canonical authority. They call them, " The Oracles 
of the Holy Ghost/' " The Word of God," and by other 
sacred names, to the same purpose. Thus, we find 
Clement of Home, whose ministry in that city continued 
from the year A. D. 91 to A. D. 110, during nearly ten 
years of the last part of the Apostle John's lifetime, 
speaking of the apostles in these words : " The apostles 
preached the gospel, being filled with the Holy Ghost. 

* * The Scriptures are the true words of the Spirit. 

* * Paul wrote to the Corinthians, things true by 
the aid of the Spirit ; he being divinely inspired, admon- 
ished them, by an epistle, concerning himself, and 
Cephas, and Apollos." Thenceforward we have other 
contemporaneous and successive writers, whose-authentic 
testimony continues in the same strain, till we reach the 
crowd of voluminous writers in the days of the Emperor 
Constantine. They are thus found in a regular order of 
witnesses, beginning with Clement and Justyn Martyr, 
and followed on by Irenaeus and Theophilus, and Cle- 
ment of Alexandria, and Tertullian, and Origen, and 
Eusebius, until we come down to any given period before 
the cause of Christianity was allied with the power of 
the state, as was the case when it was made the estab- 
lished religion of Rome by Constantine. These writers 
all give their express testimony to the universal Christ- 
ian belief, in their days, that the Holy Scriptures were 



248 INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 

all inspired, dictated and written by one and the self- 
same Holy Spirit, operating on the minds of the speak- 
ers and writers. 

The subject of inspiration is, therefore, brought down 
to our comprehension, within very narrow and intelligi- 
ble bounds. The literal and perfect preservation of the 
original text, is confirmed by many methods of the 
wonder-working Providence of God. The unmutilated 
integrity and completeness of the Old Testament wri- 
tings, has been illustrated by the religious respect which 
the Jews have always been known to hold towards their 
sacred writings — by the remarkably skilful appliances 
of their Masoretic criticism — by their mutual jealousy 
and scrutiny among the several Jewish sects, in watch- 
ing the original documents, while, at the same time, they 
were watching each other — and by their having such 
numberless copies of their sacred writings, while scat- 
tered all over the world, speaking so many different 
languages, and through such a long succession of ages. 
And yet, as we have previously seen, the agreement 
among the hundreds of their manuscripts, as recorded 
in the original Hebrew languages, is complete. 

The same methods, only much more abundantly and 
minutely, hare enabled the Christian critics to determine 
the uncorruptness and authenticity of the "New Testa- 
ment writings. These pious labors of criticism have been 
ceaseless since the Christian Scriptures were first de- 
posited in the keeping of the chureh. The inspired wri- 
tings, by quotation, and by commentary, have been re- 
produced and attested by independent testimony, apart 






1 3 



INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES. 249 

from the inspired writings, and in all successive ages. 
Mutual jealousy amongst the many different Christian 
sects, has guarded these books from interpolation by 
each other, and also has put infidels and heretics on 
their guard against Christians, thus making it impossible, 
even if there could have been the motive, to alter and 
interpolate what was originally written. At the same 
time, the many versions which were made into so great 
a variety of languages, are conformed to the original 
from which they were drawn. And when the received 
version of th jreek New Testament was compiled and 
collected, hundreds of manuscripts were diligently com- 
pared ; and gathered as they were from so many widely 
separated nations, they have been found to agree in all 
essential particulars, never varying in any essential truth 
or idea, and only marked by trivial variations of parti- 
cles and letters. 

Thus stands before us this cloud of witnesses. The 
Bible is the recorded transcript of what God designs we 
should know, both for our belief and practice, in order 
to insure the salvation of our souls. It is the treasure- 
house of divine truth. Its words are all inspired. It is 
our only standard for knowledge in religion. It will 
stand until this present constitution of things is changed. 
Heaven and earth may pass away, but nothing in this 
inspired Word of God shall fail to be fulfilled. 



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